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AT  . 


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UNIVERSITY    OF    ILLINOIS    LIBRARY    AT    URBANA-CHAMPAIGN 


JW  20 


SEP  2 1 1994 

26  H95 


L161— O-1096 


LIBRARY 

OF  THE 

UNIVERSITY.  OF  ILLINOIS 


THE  PERISTYLE  AT  THE  LAKE  FRONT 


THE  BOOK  OF 

CHICAGO 


Author  of  "THE  BOOK  OF  PHILADELPHIA," 

"THE  BOOK  OF  NEW  YORK,"  "THE  BOOK 

OF  BOSTON,"  ETC. 


ffli  IKWAW  Of  THt 
SEP  8     1931    • 
OF  ILLINOIS 


Illustrated  with  Photographs 
and  with  Drawings  by  HERBERT  PULLINGER 

THE    PENN    PUBLISHING 
COMPANY    PHILADELPHIA 

1920 


COPYRIGHT 
1920  BY 
THE  PENN 
PUBLISHING 
COMPANY 


The  Book  of  Chicago 


- '  I 


CONTENTS 

CHAPTEB  ,                                                                                                                    PAGE 

I    THIS  is  CHICAGO! 1 

II    A  CITY  WITHOUT  COBWEBS 9 

III  "WE  WILL  Go  AND  GET  THEM"  .     .     ...     .     22 

IV  THE  LAKE  FRONT 38 

V    OVER  RUSH  STREET  BRIDGE 49 

VI    THE  LOOP  HOUNDS 67 

VII    STREETS  AND  WAYS  .  84 

VIII  CLUBS  ARE  TRUMPS  .     .     ."••«'     .     ..     .    ".  101 

IX  THE  PASSING  OF  PRAIRIE  AVENUE  ....  114 

X  SOME  BOOKS  AND  WRITERS  .     ....     •     •  131 

XI    How  ART  CAME  TO  CHICAGO 155 

XII     SOME  MATTERS  OF  BUSINESS 172 

XIII  A  MODERN  CORSAIR 188 

XIV  TRAITS  AND  ASPECTS 198 

XV    Music .     .     .214 

XVI  WHERE  ONCE  WAS  THE  WHITE  CITY  .     .     .  227 

XVII    AN  OXFORD  OF  THE  WEST 239 

XVIII  THE  DUKES  OF  CHICAGO  .......  256 

XIX    A  MARQUETTE  CROSS 269 

XX    OUT  IN  THE  SUBURBS 286 

XXI  THE  EXTRAORDINARY  MAKING  OF  GARY  .     .  297 

XXII     THE  SOLITARY  DUNES 307 

XXIII  WHY   CHICAGO   Is! 316 

XXIV  THE  GOLD  COAST  .     .     .     .     .     ,     .     .     .326 
XXV  A  CHILD  AND  ITS  A-B-C   .                            .  339 


ILLUSTRATIONS 

The  Peristyle  of  the  Lake  Front    ....      Frontispiece 

The  Post-Office  . Title  Page 

A  Lion  of  the  Boulevard Opposite  Heading 

PAGE 

The  Lincoln  Monument (heading)  1 

A   Boston-like  Doorway (initial)  1 

The  Heart  of  Chicago (facing)  6 

The    Coliseum    ........      (tailpiece)  8 

A  Fine  Home  Type (initial)  9 

Projected  Union  Passenger  Station  .      .      (tailpiece)  21 

The  La  Salle  Statue   .      .      .     .     .     ,     (initial)  22 

Beauty  and  Business  .      .      .     .     .     .      (facing)  26 

Formal  Garden  in  a  Park (tailpiece)  37 

The  Houdon  Washington (initial)  38 

The  Lake  Front  Glory  of  Chicago  .      .      (facing)  44 

Chicago  from  the  Lake (tailpiece)  48 

The    Old  Water   Tower (initial)  49 

The  Vista  of  Adams  Street  ....      (facing)  58 

The  Grant  Monument (tailpiece)  66 

In  the  Heart  of  Business (initial)  67 

Michigan   Boulevard   at  Night    .      .     .      (facing)  76 

City  Hall  and  County  Building  .    ...      .      (tailpiece)  83 

The  Fourth  Presbyterian   Church    .      .      (initial)  84 

The  South  Water  Street  Market  .     .     .     (tailpiece)  100 

A  Boulevard  Drive (initial)  101 

The  Mullion-Windowed  University  Club     (facing)  104 

Clubhouse  on  the  South  Shore  .      .      .     (tailpiece)  113 

The  Massacre  Monument (initial)  114 


ILLUSTKATIONS 

PAOl 

Alexander   Hamilton (tailpiece)  130 

Interior  of  Blackstone  Library   .      .      .  (initial)  131 

The  Logan  Monument (facing)  134 

The    Public    Library (tailpiece)  154 

An  Art  Institute  Vista (initial)  155 

The  Art  Institute (facing)  158 

Fountain  of  the  Great  Lakes  ....  (tailpiece)  171 

Chicago's  "Boul'  Mich."  .      .      .      .      .  (initial)  172 

The  Wall  Street  of  Chicago  ....  (facing)  180 

The  Freight  Subway (tailpiece)  187 

A  Lakeside  Venetian  Home  ....  (initial)  188 

The   Great   Municipal  Pier    ....  (tailpiece)  197 

A  Modern  Bridge (initial)  198 

The  New  Field  Museum (facing)  206 

The  Blackstone  Theatre (tailpiece)  213 

Stairway  in  the  Public  Library  .      .      .  (initial)  214 

A  Water  Garden (tailpiece)  226 

Main  Entrance  of  the  University    .      .  (initial)  227 

A  Beautiful  Ruin  of  the  White  City  .  (facing)  232 

La  Rabida (tailpiece)  238 

The  Three  Towers (initial)  239 

Some  Towers  of  the  University  .      .      .  (facing)  248 

The  University  Library (tailpiece)  255 

The  Illinois  Centennial  Monument  .      .  (initial)  256 

The  Courtyard  of  Hull  House   .      .      .  (facing)  262 

A  Bascule  Bridge   .      .      .    . .     .      .      .  (tailpiece)  268 

In  the  Ghetto (initial)  269 

The  Marquette  Cross (facing)  278 

One  of  the  Great  Hospitals   .         .      .  (tailpiece)  285 

The  Lake  Shore  of  the  North  Suburbs  .  (initial)  286 

One  of  the  Long  Bathing  Beaches  .      .  (facing)  294 

A  North-bound  Driveway (tailpiece)  296 

The   Gary  Tower (initial)  297 

One  of  the  Gary  Schools (tailpiece)  306 


ILLUSTRATIONS 

PAGE 

A  Sandhill  in  the  Dunes  .....  (initial)  307 

The  Dunes  of  Lake  Michigan    .      .     .  (facing)  310 

Shifting  Sands  and  Dark  Trees  .      .     .  (tailpiece)  315 

A  Georgian  House  on  Astor  Street  .      .  (initial)  316 

Oxford-like  Charm,  at  the  University  .  (facing)  322 

Homes  of  the  Lake  Shore  Drive  .     .     .  (tailpiece)  325 

Fine  Parkside  Living (initial)  326 

Along  the  Shore  of  Lake  Michigan  .      .  (tailpiece)  338 

A  Garden  Gateway (initial)  339 

The  Lincoln  Monument (facing)  342 

A  Lagoon  of  Lincoln  Park  ....  (tailpiece)  347 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

CHAPTER  I 

THIS  is  CHICAGO! 

HIS  is  Chicago!  The 
city  looks  out  upon 
Lake  Michigan  from  a 
stretch  of  unbroken 
flatness.  Her  morn- 
ing face  shines  brightly 
in  the  sun. 

This  is  Chicago ! 
An  audacious  city  that 
audaciously  set  herself 
in  a  swamp:  but  the 
swamp  long  ago  was 
obliterated  and  only 
the  audacity  remains. 
A  city  of  dreams  and  with  the  practical  ability  to 

1 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

make  the  dreams  come  true.  A  city  of  energy  and 
strength;  of  immensity  of  strength.  It  was  long 
ago  written  that  a  city  set  upon  a  hill  cannot  be 
hid;  yet  here  upon  a  plain  is  a  city  that  cannot  be 
hid. 

An  interesting  city,  yet  with  great  areas  of  the  un- 
attractive. An  extraordinary  city,  yet  with  much 
that  is  extraordinarily  ordinary.  An  amusing  city, 
yet  with  a  great  deal  of  dullness.  An  admirable 
city,  yet  in  many  respects  unadmirable  in  the  ex- 
treme. A  beautiful  city  in  long  and  glorious 
stretches,  yet  in  its  massing  of  miseries  a  terrible 
city.  A  gay  yet  sober  city.  A  bright  dull  city.  A 
happy  unhappy  city.  A  light-hearted,  buoyant, 
vivacious,  debonair  city,  a  city  with  an  air ! — in  fact, 
in  another  sense,  a  city  with  airs  that  are  often  very 
fierce  ones,  blowing  straight  in  from  the  lake,  with 
drenching  rain  or  pitiless  cold. 

I  shall  write  of  the  people  as  well  as  of  the  city  for 
in  a  peculiar  degree  the  people  have  made  their  city. 
I  shall  write  of  their  character  and  characteristics.  I 
shall  aim  to  set  forth  the  city  and  the  spirit  of  the  city. 
I  shall  describe  the  city  in  its  present  seeming  and  at 
times  the  descriptions  of  the  present  will  summon  up 
remembrance  of  things  past. 

A  city  with  much  of  charm,  with  much  of  dignity, 
with  much  of  beauty.  A  very  human  city,  with 
pleasantly  piquant  peculiarities.  A  city  of  the  well- 
bred,  of  people  of  cultivation,  yet  also  a  city  of  the 
contrary  of  all  this.  A  city  all  alive,  vividly  alive. 

All  this  is  Chicago.  A  city,  one  sees,  of  contra- 

2 


THIS  IS  CHICAGO! 

dictions,  and  of  contradictions  more  than  usually 
conspicuous.  A  city  to  be  loved.  A  city  where 
people  live  in  careful  comfort  while  their  neighbors 
live  beyond  their  means — and  sometimes,  die  beyond 
their  means.  A  pretentious  city;  with  a  vast  deal 
of  unpretentiousness  even  on  the  part  of  such  as 
might  be  pardoned  personal  assertion.  Important 
city  that  it  is,  it  is  filled  with  a  sense  of  that  import- 
ance; and  its  people  are  naively  ready  to  tell  of  it 
at  any  time  and  at  any  place  and  to  any  person.  To 
the  Chicagoan,  Chicago  is  the  most  important  sub- 
ject in  the  world,  so  why  should  he  or  she  not  speak 
of  it  frankly  and  unabashed !  That  Chicago  novelist 
understood  this  who  described  a  young  woman  as  "a 
true  daughter  of  Chicago;  she  had  rather  talk  to  a 
stranger  about  her  own  town  than  about  any  other 
subject."  And  it  is  a  very  old  story  that  tells  of  a 
funeral  in  New  York  at  which  the  clergyman,  not 
having  much  to  say,  asked  any  of  those  present  to 
offer  a  few  words  about  the  departed,  whereupon 
there  was  silence  until  a  stranger  arose  and  re- 
marked that,  as  no  one  seemed  to  want  to  talk  of  the 
deceased,  he  would  take  the  opportunity  to  tell  them 
something  of  Chicago. 

Keady  though  Chicago  is  to  exploit  herself,  even  to 
vociferation,  it  is  one  of  the  oddest  contradictions  of 
the  city  that  although  there  is  a  firm  here  which 
makes  a  feature  of  guidebooks  for  principal  Amer- 
ican cities,  it  publishes  no  such  book  of  Chicago !  I 
was  told  that  a  few  years  ago  a  Chicago  guide  was 
published  by  them,  and  that  it  was  under  considera- 

3 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

tion  to  do  so  again.  And  I  think  it  may  safely  be 
said  that  this  is  the  only  opportunity  for  exploita- 
tion that  has  ever  been  missed. 

And  after  all,  I  think  that  Chicago,  in  the  matter 
of  self-assurance,  never  really  surpassed  Boston, 
judging  by  a  Boston  newspaper  reference  to  one  of 
its  churches,  built  less  than  a  century  ago,  as  the 
"Westminster  Abbey  of  Boston"!  And  this  is  re- 
mindful of  an  impression  which  has  come  more  and 
more  to  assert  itself ;  and  that  is,  that  there  is  much 
of  essential  likeness  between  Boston  and  Chicago, 
much  of  likeness  in  spirit  between  the  old  city  of  the 
Atlantic  coast  and  this  new  city  which  gazes  off,  as 
if  into  a  glorious  future,  across  the  shimmering 
sweeps  of  Lake  Michigan.  And,  evoked  by  this  men- 
tion of  Boston,  comes  the  odd  fact  that  I  have  seen 
more  "Boston  bags"  in  Chicago  than  anywhere  else 
except  in  the  city  which  gave  that  extremely  service- 
able and  good-looking  leather  bag  its  name. 

The  old-time  Chicagoan  who  alliteratively  ex- 
pressed his  faith  in  "women,  wine,  whiskey  and 
war, ' '  spoke,  broadly,  for  his  city.  And  it  may  well 
ask, — leaving  out  the  three  last  items  and  taking  just 
the  first — what  other  city  can  boast  of  the  contem- 
porary and  diversified  activities  of  three  such  leaders 
as  Frances  Willard,  Jane  Addams  and  Mrs.  Potter 
Palmer ! 

In  Chicago,  money  talks.  And  it  was  a  clever 
Chicagoan  who  observed  that  when  money  talks  it 
talks  offensively.  And  yet,  usually,  in  this  unusual 
city,  there  is  a  disarming  frankness,  or  even  child- 

4 


THIS  IS  CHICAGO! 

likeness,  about  it.  As,  just  the  other  day,  the  son  of 
a  chewing-gum  maker,  in  telling  to  a  newspaper  of 
his  acquisition  of  a  house  on  the  Lake  Front,  says: 
"My  father  bought  it  from  Brewer  Blank,  and  now 
its  mine.  A  gift  from  my  father  f  No !  I  paid  him 
a  hundred  and  twenty-five  thousand  for  it,  in  good 
hard  cash.  My  father 's  city  home  will  be  at  the 
Hotel  So-and-so"  (naming  the  most  expensive). 
"But  he  spends  most  of  his  summers  at  Lake  Geneva, 
and  he's  got  a  winter  home  in  Pasadena,  and  he 
owns  all  of  Catalina  Island. ' '  This,  you  notice,  with 
wealthy  insouciance;  rather  desirous,  one  would 
gather,  of  taking  the  world  into  his  wealthy  con- 
fidence ;  and  ending  with  the  delightfully  unexpected 
Catalina  touch ! 

Chicago  is  a  hospitable  city.  One  who  comes  with 
introductions,  as  the  friend  of  some  Chicagoan's 
friend,  or  who  is  known,  is  given  a  fine  and  cordial 
welcome.  And  not  only  is  the  coming  guest  wel- 
comed, but  a  guest's  parting  may  be  unexpectedly 
speeded :  as,  when  a  man,  not  with  proper  credentials 
— for  he  was  an  absconding  bank  cashier  from  New 
York — crept  with  hesitation  into  the  hall  where  was 
in  progress  a  Saturday  night  meeting  conducted  by 
a  Chicagoan  who,  as  the  head  of  an  educational  insti- 
tution and  as  an  essentially  undenominational 
preacher,  is  in  the  habit  of  capturing  the  hearts  of 
his  hearers.  The  absconder,  deeply  moved,  sought 
a  private  talk  with  him  at  the  close  of  the  meeting, 
and  made  confession  of  his  misdeeds.  He  had  left 
New  York  by  a  Friday  evening  train.  Not  until 

5 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

Monday  morning  would  there  be  discovery  of  his 
crime.  With  a  Chicagoan,  to  think  is  to  act.  Con- 
vinced that  the  trembling  man  before  him  felt 
genuine  remorse  and  was  of  potential  honesty  of  pur- 
pose, the  preacher  said:  "You  will  go  back  to  New 
York  to-night.  I  will  go  with  you.  We  will  take  the 
midnight  train ;  and  when  the  bank  opens  on  Monday 
morning  you  and  I  will  be  together  there  to  meet 
your  directors. ' '  And  they  were. 

The  seal  of  the  city  mingles  the  present  and  the 
past.  A  sheaf  of  wheat  is  in  the  middle ;  and,  oddly 
and  of  course  quite  unintentionally,  there  is  some- 
thing about  the  way  in  which  it  is  presented  in  mid- 
air, which  suggests  the  idea  that  it  is  held  on  a  pair 
of  hidden  horns.  There  is  a  ship  under  full  sail 
before  a  brisk  northeast  wind ;  and  sailing  ships  are 
now  an  uncommon  sight  here  in  these  days  of  steam. 
There  are  rippling  waves  represented,  and  this, 
naturally,  the  city  still  has  in  its  view;  although 
many  a  Chicagoan,  some  in  jest  but  most  of  them  in 
very  serious  earnest,  have  lamented  the  presence  of 
the  lake  as  something  which  has  prevented  the  laying 
out  of  streets  to  the  eastward.  And  you  will  be  told 
that  thousands  and  thousands  of  Chicagoans  have 
never  seen  the  lake ;  this  being  literally  the  case,  be- 
cause immense  numbers  of  foreigners,  living  to  the 
west  of  the  river,  do  not  readily  get  to  the  Lake 
Front  even  if  they  come  to  the  central  business  sec- 
tion. 

The  seal  of  the  city  also  bears  the  representation, 
au  naturel,  of  a  Chicago  baby,  on  a  Botticelli  half- 

6 


LIBRARY 

OF  THE 

UNIVERSITY  OF  ILLINOIS 


THIS  IS  CHICAGO! 

shell;  and,  for  contrast,  there  is  a  standing  Indian, 
clad  sedately  in  trousers:  and  this  restraint  can 
scarcely  be  credited  to  modest  Victorian  influence, 
for  Chicago  received  her  charter  as  a  city  and  became 
the  Queen  of  the  Great  Lakes  in  the  very  year  in 
which  Victoria  became  Queen  of  Great  Britain. 

That  the  Indian  stands  on  a  bluff  seems  to  be 
wrong,  for  Chicago  is  too  uniformly  level  to  have  a 
bluff ;  and  then  comes  the  thought  that  it  is  precisely 
right  after  all,  for  Chicago,  from  the  beginning,  has 
made  bluffs  and  has  successfully  stood  upon  them. 

The  motto  of  the  city,  upon  the  seal,  "Urbs  in 
horto,"  seems  curiously  at  variance  with  the  swift- 
ness of  the  city's  life;  but  it  brings  up  thoughts  of 
the  charm  of  the  past,  when  Chicago  won  the  name 
of  the  " Garden  City"!  And  still  the  influence  of 
those  early  days  successfully  persists,  in  the  con- 
tinued building  of  detached  homes,  instead  of  houses 
built  closely  one  against  another.  And  with  that 
spirit  of  charming  open  living,  still  so  prevalent, 
there  was  a  friendliness  of  life  which  has  had  much 
to  do  with  the  city's  progress;  there  came  a  fine  sim- 
plicity, which  gave  the  characteristic  first-name  in- 
timacy, and  set  the  ideal  of  public  school  education 
as  co-education.  A  home  city,  a  garden  city — one 
sees,  again,  that  this  city  of  gigantic  business  is  a 
city  of  contradictions.  And  although  gardens  are 
not  now  common,  and  although  most  of  the  old-time 
houses  have  disappeared,  one  may  come,  here  and 
there,  upon  some  delightful  reminder  of  the  ' '  Garden 
City"  of  the  past,  as  when  I  noticed,  well  out  on 

7 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

Lincoln  Avenue,  a  spacious  old  square-front  house; 
a  house  with  more  than  a  suggestion  of  the  dilapida- 
tion that  so  readily  comes  with  age;  with  great  an- 
cient hedge  of  lilac,  and,  yes !  an  ancient  garden. 

Although  Chicagoans  speak  in  superlatives  in 
praise  of  their  city,  there  is  now  and  then  an  excep- 
tion, who  will  animadvert  upon  it  with  savagery,  in 
some  New  York  or  Boston  interview  or  article;  as 
for  example  a  poet  who,  complaining  poignantly  of 
his  city,  was  asked  why  he  continued  to  live  there,  to 
which  he  replied,  "with  a  hopeless  gesture,"  and 
with  modest  poetic  implication:  "Why  did  Dante 
stay  in  Florence?  Because  it  was  his  particular 
hell.  Chicago  is  mine." 

"And  he  has  really  opened  up  his  heart,"  said 
a  Cliff  Dweller  to  a  Cliff  Dweller  group,  who  were 
discussing  the  interview. 

"No,"  countered  another,  with  a  smile;  "he 
merely  opened  up  his  spleen." 


8 


CHAPTER  II 


A   CITY   WITHOUT   COBWEBS 

HE  Chicagoan  con- 
siders that  his  city's 
zone  of  influence  is 
very  wide.  Within  a 
radius  of  five  hundred 
miles,  he  will  tell  you, 
there  live  fifty  million  peo- 
ple, able  to  leave  their  homes 
in  the  evening  and  breakfast 
in  Chicago  the  next  morning. 
And  this  to  the  Chicagoan  is 
a  statement  well  rounded  and  complete.  That  the 
fifty  million  do  not  all  take  advantage  of  the  situation 
merely  means  that  they  do  not,  all  of  them,  all  the 
time,  rise  to  their  opportunity. 

Chicago  is  "the  greatest  railway  center  in  the 
world. "  No  Chicagoan  asks  you  to  prove  this ;  they 
do  not  need  proof.  And  Chicago  is  immensely  proud 
of  the  fact  that  all  the  trains  which  enter  the  city  stop 
there ;  that  it  is,  for  all,  the  terminal. 

The  first  railway  timetable  of  Chicago,  so  it  is  still 
kept  in  mind,  dates  back  to  1858 ;  and  this  is  remind- 
ful of  other  firsts  in  the  career  of  the  city.  For,  al- 
though I  am  writing  of  the  Chicago  of  today  and  of 

9 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

what  I  see  and  hear  around  me,  the  spirit  of  the 
present  is  so  closely  interwoven  with  the  spirit  of  the 
past  that  the  past,  to  some  extent,  cannot  but  be  con- 
sidered. 

It  was  in  1804  that  the  first  white  child  was  born 
here ;  less  than  a  century  and  a  quarter  ago ;  and  no 
one  need  smile  because  the  firsts  of  Chicago  are 
recent.  Eather,  there  should  be  amazement,  that 
from  such  recent  beginnings  such  vast  results  have 
come.  Every  city  must  have  a  beginning.  Eomulus 
and  Eemus  and  the  wolf  and  the  lupine  luncheon  were 
once  quite  as  new  as  the  happenings  that  have  made 
Chicago.  And  as  to  wolves,  their  cries  were  still 
heard  on  the  Lake  Front,  now  lined  by  hotels  and 
business  blocks,  little  more  than  a  century  ago,  as 
they  pawed  over  the  neglected  and  bleaching  bones 
of  the  victims  of  the  massacre  by  the  Indians  in  the 
war  with  England.  And  to  me  it  more  than  any- 
thing else  represents  Chicago's  youth,  that  Joseph 
Jefferson,  the  lovable  "  Joe,"  so  recently  dead  that 
his  vivid  personality  seems  still  alive,  walked  this 
very  Lake  Front,  as  a  little  boy,  with  his  father  who, 
gun  in  hand,  hunted  for  wolf  or  wild  duck. 

While  hunting  was  thus  possible  along  the  lake, 
a  near-by  section  was  busy  with  saws  and  hammers. 
Boy  that  he  was,  little  Joe  was  impressed  by  the 
rawness  and  newness.  Everywhere,  as  he  describes 
it,  boardwalks  were  going  down  and  frame  buildings 
were  going  up;  there  were  wooden  houses,  wooden 
hotels,  wooden  churches,  and  a  wooden  theater  in 
which  the  family  fortunes  were  sunk. 

10 


A  CITY  WITHOUT  COBWEBS 

All  about  were  sand  dune  and  morass  and  swamp 
and  prairie;  and  from  those  early  days  has  come 
down  the  local  use  of  the  word  "prairie"  as  mean- 
ing, not  a  broadly  smiling  sweep  of  grass  and  flowers, 
the  picture  evolved  elsewhere  by  the  word,  but  grim, 
bare,  level  stretches,  or  endless  miles  of  scrub 
growth,  wicked  and  wet. 

What  was  outwardly  but  a  rough  and  raw  little 
place,  made  formally  a  city  in  1837,  as  soon  as  the 
necessary  handful  of  population  had  gathered,  did 
not  choose  for  its  first  mayor  a  man  of  corresponding 
roughness  of  aspect,  but  one  who  had  just  dis- 
tinguished himself  by  building  the  first  house  in  Chi- 
cago from  an  architect's  plans,  and  whose  thoughts 
turned  naturally  to  culture  and  art  and  European 
travel.  From  the  first  there  was  a  surprising  leaven 
in  Chicago's  loaf.  And  tales  have  come  down,  al- 
most mystically  vague — for  already  the  rise  of  Chi- 
cago seems  almost  fairy  tale — of  men  and  women  in 
broadcloth  and  silks  and  diamonds  attending  parties 
in  the  hastily  put  together  frame  houses  such  as 
those  of  which  Jefferson  tells,  and  of  the  talk  often 
turning  to  the  best  books  and  writers. 

And  the  very  first  book  to  be  printed  and  bound 
and  published  in  Chicago  was  the  city  directory! 
Could  anything  be  more  delightfully  characteristic 
— publicity  for  every  Chicagoan  in  the  first  book ! 

The  first  coroner  of  Chicago,  one  learns,  was  a 
certain  Clark,  and  his  first  inquest,  as  the  old  record 
somewhat  tautologically  tells,  was  on  "the  body  of 
a  dead  Indian."  Nowadays,  one  may  hear  the 

11 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

charge — or  boast! — that  the  city,  in  this  twentieth 
century,  averages  a  murder  a  day. 

The  first  Sunday  liquor  law  went  into  force  in 
1834,  and  although  activity  was  encouraged  by  giving 
the  informer  half  of  the  fine,  which  was  five  dollars, 
there  seem  to  have  been  no  particular  results.  That 
the  first  steam  fire  engine  was  put  into  use  in  1857 
under  the  mayoralty  of  the  redoubtable  Long  John 
Wentworth  is  still  remembered,  as  is  also  the  fact 
that  he  promptly  put  it  to  a  use  not  intended  by  the 
inventor;  the  literal  washing  out  of  an  unsavory 
settlement  just  at  the  edge  of  the  city.  For  although 
Chicago  proper  was  not  at  that  time  very  large,  Chi- 
cago improper  was  looked  upon  as  being  very  much 
too  large  indeed,  and  so,  to  the  glee  of  a  good  share 
of  the  population,  or  rather  of  a  bad  share  of 
the  population,  who  looked  on  as  at  a  show,  the 
fire  engine  was  made  to  turn  its  hose  on  some  poor 
little  shanties,  with  their  women  denizens,  on  the 
shore  just  north  of  the  site  of  the  present  great 
recreation  pier ;  and  the  hose  stream  drove  wreckage 
into  the  lake,  while  the  wretched  human  wreckage, 
drenched  and  miserable,  crept,  drenched  and  miser- 
able, away. 

The  first  water  main  was  laid  in  1836 — two  miles 
of  wooden  pipes ;  but  it  was  not  until  twenty  years 
afterwards  that  the  first  sewers  were  laid.  And  I 
place  these  two  facts  together  because  I  have  just 
read  the  claim  that  at  present  the  combined  water 
and  sewer  mains  of  the  city  are  longer  than  the  com- 

12 


A  CITY  WITHOUT  COBWEBS 

bined  length  of  the  Mississippi,  the  Ohio  and  the 
Missouri. 

The  first  vaccination  was  in  1848,  and  it  was  the 
great  topic  of  conversation  until  1850,  when  classical 
music,  or  at  least  opera,  was  first  presented.  That 
the  town  assumed,  in  1833,  such  dignity  as  attends 
the  making  of  a  fire  warden,  does  not  imply  that  one 
was  not  needed  still  earlier ;  and  it  was  not  till  1841 
that  it  bourgeoned  with  the  greater  glory  of  its  first 
city  marshal. 

As  the  city  gives  the  impression  of  having  an 
astonishing  number  of  drug  stores,  it  being  really 
difficult  to  get  away  from  the  sight  of  one  or  more 
of  them  at  every  moment,  it  may  be  remarked  that 
the  first  drug  store  was  of  1832 ;  though  it  need  not 
be  supposed  that  there  was  any  difficulty  in  getting 
terrific  boluses  or  terrific  doses  of  firewater  for  the 
terrific  attacks  of  fever  and  ague  inseparable  from  a 
new  settlement  in  such  a  wet  place. 

The  year  1833  was  notable  religiously,  for  in  that 
year  the  earliest  Presbyterian  church  was  organized, 
the  first  Baptist  church  was  built,  and  the  first  perm- 
anent Eoman  Catholic  parish  was  organized.  There 
also  began,  that  year,  Chicago's  first  newspaper,  a 
weekly:  and  it  was  in  1839  that  a  new  newspaper  an- 
nounced, with  a  cheerful  earnestness  that  would  not 
forego  a  pleasantly  punning  expression  of  it,  that 
"We  now  launch  our  bark  on  the  great  ocean  of  the 
world,  with  plenty  of  sheet,  but  still  with  no  certainty 
of  sale. "  It  was  some  years  after  this  that  the  press 

13 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

was  offered  that  public  subject  of  discussion,  a  de- 
tective department,  for  not  until  1850  did  Chicago 
have  its  first  detective,  which  is  not  to  say  that  many 
a  wrong-doer  was  not  previously  detected;  the  first 
formal  detective  being  one  Allen  Pinkerton,  after- 
wards not  unknown  to  fame,  particularly  for  dis- 
covering the  supposed  danger  which  made  Lincoln, 
on  a  memorable  occasion,  turn  up  his  collar  and  pull 
down  his  hat  and  make  his  way  into  Washington 
unobserved.  And  mention  of  the  emancipator  is  re- 
mindful that  the  first  white  settler  of  Chicago,  as 
distinguished  from  explorers  and  temporary  abiders, 
was,  as  Chicagoans  themselves  express  it,  a  black 
man ;  but  just  a  West  Indian  negro,  as  they  will  ex- 
plain, after  you  have  been  properly  surprised. 

There  is  poetic  vagueness  about  what  is  said  to 
have  been  the  city's  first  university;  most  Chi- 
cago'ans  look  upon  it  as  a  myth  if  they  have  heard 
of  it  at  all;  and  if  there  is  to  be  a  city  myth  it  is 
certainly  a  charming  imagination  to  have  it  a  sup- 
posititious university  of  "St.  Mary's  of  the  Lake." 
It  is  more  interesting  from  its  very  vagueness  than 
it  would  be  with  date  and  endowment  definitely  dis- 
covered, if  it  ever  really  had  a  date  and  an  endow- 
ment, or  with  the  idea  of  its  existence  definitely 
destroyed. 

Whatever  others  may  think  of  the  city,  Chicago 
has  always  prided  herself,  on  the  whole,  with 
efficiency  of  city  government,  and  this  in  spite  of  ter- 
rific political  contests  in  which  the  bitterest  charges 
and  countercharges  have  been  made ;  and  in  spite  of 

14 


A  CITY  WITHOUT  COBWEBS 

the  most  extreme  statements  regarding  jobbery  and 
corruption.  But  in  the  matter  of  street  cleaning,  or 
atmosphere  cleaning,  no  Chicagoan  has  been  harbor- 
ing prideful  feelings.  The  thick  dust,  driven  in 
clouds  from  uncleaned  streets,  the  thick  black  smoke 
emerging  in  clouds  from  myriad  chimneys,  with 
much  of  it  heavily  sinking  to  the  level  of  the  pave- 
ments and  swirling  in  evil  blotchings,  mark  what,  as 
I  write,  is  the  most  apparent  of  the  city's  delin- 
quencies. Soap  is  the  prime  Chicago  necessity. 
But  the  people  have  so  triumphed  as  to  keep  them- 
selves a  spotless  folk,  after  all,  in  this  so  far  from 
spotless  town.  And  yet  Monday  morning  does  not 
show  a  clothes-line  aspect,  either  on  the  roofs  or  in 
the  yards.  So  sooty  is  the  city  that  drying  must 
needs  be  done  in  kitchen  or  basement  or  attic.  The 
white  waist  of  an  elevator  girl  lasts  for  two  days' 
use. 

It  has  been  an  important  factor,  in  the  develop- 
ment of  Chicago,  that  the  business  section  of  the  city 
is  practically  where  it  was  a  half  century  ago,  or 
even  a  century  ago.  Where  Chicago  began,  she  has 
continued.  There  could  be  no  greater  contrast  be- 
tween New  York  and  Chicago  in  this  particular,  New 
York  having  swept  ceaselessly  on  for  miles  and  miles 
with  its  constantly  shifting  merchandizing  head- 
quarters. 

In  the  very  early  days,  before  Chicago  established 
herself  here,  the  place  was  avoided  even  by  the 
Indians  themselves  as  a  marshy  terror,  even  though 
the  importance  of  the  Chicago  Eiver  portage  was  in 

15 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

early  days  recognized.  Yet  the  site  upon  which  Chi- 
cago was  to  arise  was  claimed  by  three  States :  nat- 
urally enough,  Chicagoans  will  concede,  in  view  of 
the  consequence  that  was  to  accrue;  indeed,  they 
deem  the  only  matter  for  surprise  to  be  that  Chicago 
was  not  claimed  by  more  than  three ! 

The  claim  of  Virginia  was  by  right  of  conquest, 
George  Rogers  Clark,  a  Virginian,  having  led  Vir- 
ginians in  the  marvelous  campaign  which  secured  the 
Northwest  Territory  for  the  United  States.  (Clark 
Street  is  named  for  him.)  Connecticut  claimed  by 
right  of  its  charter,  which  gave  ownership  due  west 
to  the  Mississippi.  New  York  claimed  by  conquest ; 
but  the  conquest  was  quite  by  indirection,  New  York 
having  humbled  the  Iroquois  and  claimed  rulership 
over  them,  and  the  Iroquois  having  previously  ex- 
tended their  claims  of  dominion  over  the  Indians  of 
the  Illinois  region.  But  Virginia,  Connecticut  and 
New  York  agreed  rather  gracefully  to  unite  in  turn- 
ing over  to  the  United  States  Government  their 
claims  to  the  Illinois  country. 

But,  for  a  time,  this  locality  was  actually  governed 
as  part  of  Virginia.  Delightful  old  Marietta,  in 
Ohio,  was  the  seat  of  the  government  for  a  time 
under  the  Ordinance  of  1787,  for  Illinois ;  and  a  little 
later  Vincennes,  in  Indiana,  became  the  center  of 
government  for  the  Chicago  region;  and  the  long- 
faced,  long-headed  fighter,  William  Henry  Harrison, 
later  to  be  known  an  "Tippecanoe,"  and  still  later 
to  be  President  and  the  grandfather  of  another 
President,  was  made  governor. 

16 


A  CITY  WITHOUT  COBWEBS 

When  Illinois  took  on  the  dignity  of  Statehood, 
after  a  probational  period  as  a  Territory,  Chicago 
was  almost  put  into  Wisconsin !  For  the  bill  declar- 
ing Statehood  designated  a  line  along  the  southern 
end  of  Lake  Michigan,  by  which  the  then  village  of 
Chicago  was  to  be  left  out  of  Illinois  and  put  into 
Wisconsin!  But  an  Illinois  territorial  delegate  to 
Congress  succeeded  in  having  the  line  so  altered  as 
to  leave  Chicago  in  Illinois:  the  delegate  being  a 
certain  Nathaniel  Pope;  who  was  later  to  achieve 
another  kind  of  fame  by  becoming  the  father  of  the 
Civil  War  soldier,  General  John  Pope. 

To  name  the  counties  in  which  the  place  was  lo- 
cated would  surely  make  Chicago  seem  a  lost  sort 
of  place.  For  a  time  it  was  in  Illinois  County,  later 
in  Wayne ;  then,  for  a  few  years,  in  no  county  at  all, 
owing  to  some  geographical  oversight.  Later,  Chi- 
cago became,  in  turn,  in  Madison  County,  in  Ed- 
wards, in  Crawford,  in  Clark,  in  Pike,  in  Peoria; 
and  only  after  this  bewilderng  succession  of  changes 
did  the  city,  in  1831,  settle  into  homely  Cook. 

It  has  more  than  once  occurred  to  me  that  the 
names  of  the  counties  of  Illinois  not  only  represent 
the  home-loving  Americanism  of  the  State,  but  have 
themselves  had  an  influence  in  encouraging  the 
admirable  homely  and  patriotic  qualities.  Cook 
County,  indeed,  is  prosaically  named;  and  not  far 
away  is  the  likewise  prosaically  named  Bureau 
County!  And  glancing  further  at  the  map,  it  will 
be  i^oticed  that  there  is  profusion  of  names  of  homely 
and  intimate  quality,  as,  Edward  County,  Will 

17 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

County,  Henry,  Alexander,  Edgar.  No  wonder  that 
a  first-name  intimacy  is  such  a  common  feature,  here 
beside  Lake  Michigan.  And  a  further  homely  touch 
comes  in  the  recognition  of  Mrs.  Grundy  in  Grundy 
County  I 

But  patriotism  in  county  names  is  even  more 
marked.  There  are  Washington  and  Jefferson  and 
Hamilton,  Moultrie  and  Greene,  Knox,  McDonough 
and  Madison,  Marion  and  Hancock,  Franklin, 
Schuyler,  Boone  and  Wayne,  Pulaski  and  Fayette, 
Gallatin  and  Warren  and  St.  Clair  and  Perry,  Ran- 
dolph, Marshall,  Putnam  and  Stark.  The  name  of 
Burr  is  intentionally  absent;  Illinois  would  have 
nothing  of  him !  But  there  is,  instead,  a  Jo  Daviess 
County  in  honor  of  the  man  who,  in  Kentucky,  prose- 
cuted Burr  for  treason  in  the  early  days  of  the  con- 
spiracy, when  Burr  was  still  in  control  of  wealth  and 
power.  Daviess  died  at  Tippecanoe :  a  battle  which 
somehow  seems  to  have  furnished  a  Battle  Eoll  for 
Chicago. 

A  Chicago  poet  who  won  considerable  fame, 
Moody,  sang  of  his  own  city  in  what  was  meant  to  be 
swinging  phrase : 

"Gigantic,  willful,  young, 

Chicago  sitteth  at  the  northwest  gate, 

With  restless  violent  hands  and  casual  tongue, 

Molding  her  mighty  fate." 

When  Joaquin  Miller  wrote  of  San  Francisco  as 
being  at  the  western  gate  it  meant  something.  But 
Chicago  is  not  at  any  particular  gate.  She  is  not 

18 


A  CITY  WITHOUT  COBWEBS 

even  at  the  foot  of  Lake  Michigan,  where  every 
easterner  thinks  she  stands,  but  on  the  western 
shore,  some  miles  above  the  lower  end  of  the  lake, 
so  that  her  lake  frontage  is  not  to  the  northward  but 
altogether  to  the  east.  The  city  is  not  a  gateway, 
which  implies  a  place  to  pass  through,  but  is 
markedly  a  stopping  point,  as  several  million  folk 
have  demonstrated. 

Chicago  is  an  extremely  cosmopolitan  city.  Both 
the  Atlantic  and  Pacific  Oceans  are  hers.  The  Chi- 
cago newspapers  advertise,  impartially,  sailings  to 
Honolulu  or  Plymouth,  to  Japan  or  France.  There 
is  a  sort  of  insouciance  about  it.  And  also  there  is 
insouciance  in  her  evident  determination  to  remain 
young  no  matter  how  the  years  are  piling  up.  With 
all  the  intense  absorption  in  work,  there  goes  also 
an  intense  absorption  in  play;  and  you  will  notice 
such  advertisements  as  that  of  the  *  *  Fisherman 's 
Special,"  whose  times  are  so  arranged  as  to  take 
Chicagoans,  with  equipment  of  dining  cars  and  sleep- 
ing cars,  from  Friday  night  until  Monday,  on  long 
trips  up  among  the  lakes  of  Wisconsin. 

With  all  its  rush,  of  work  and  play,  the  city  is  not 
too  busy  to  be  honest,  so  one  would  gather  from  the 
great  number  of  advertisements  of  purses  lost;  for 
this  would  seem  to  indicate  a  well-founded  assump- 
tion as  to  the  likelihood  of  recovery.  Or  is  it  merely 
indicative  of  a  sort  of  na'ive  trustfulness! — for  I 
notice  very  few  advertisements  of  purses  found. 
And  there  are  so  many  advertisements  of  lost  dogs 
that  it  must  needs  be  that  excellent  kind  of  a  city,  a 

19 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

dog  lover's  city;  even  though,  in  these  days  of  motor 
cars,  dogs  are  seldom  seen  except  in  the  parks. 
Pick  up  any  newspaper ;  in  the  first  one  are  adver- 
tisements for  an  Airedale  named  Eip ;  for  a  Pekinese 
named  Bubbles,  light  brown  with  two  white  front 
paws;  don't  you  wish  you  could  find  the  faithful 
Kip,  and  don 't  you  wish  you  could  restore  the  white- 
pawed  Bubbles  to  his  mistress?  And  in  the  same 
paper  I  notice  that  there  is  a  lost  "  little  black  and 
tan  dog,  named  Daisy."  All  good  homely  names, 
too;  and  the  naming  of  dogs  is  an  indication  of 
character — of  the  owners,  not  of  the  dogs,  except  in 
the  sense  that  dogs  usually  follow  the  character  of 
their  owners.  I  like  to  think  of  the  names  of  George 
Washington's  dogs,  such  as  Juno,  Mopsey  and  True- 
love. 

Chicago  is  justly  known  as  the  Windy  City.  Great 
v/inds  come  sweeping  from  the  lake.  And  Chi- 
cagoans  laugh,  and  say  that  they  blow  cobwebs  from 
the  brain.  But  even  while  thus  jesting,  they  never 
for  a  moment  believe  that  Chicago  brains  have  any 
cobwebs.  And  I  knew  that  the  Chicagoan  who 
soberly  remarked  to  me  that  the  winds  thus  take  the 
place  of  vacuum  cleaners  meant  it  for  humor  only. 
Constantly,  one  notices  examples  of  the  city's  quick 
and  uncobwebbed  thinking.  For  example,  not  long 
ago  a  man  entered  his  motor-car  with  two  thousand 
dollars  that  he  had  just  drawn  from  a  bank;  three 
men  boarded  his  car  as  he  started  off,  and  attacked 
him;  two  of  the  men  dragged  him  from  the  wheel, 
and  held  him  down,  fiercely  struggling,  while  the 

20 


A  CITY  WITHOUT  COBWEBS 

third  put  the  car  to  top  speed.  But  a  man  in  the 
conning  tower  of  a  lift  bridge  saw  the  approaching 
car  and  saw  that  there  was  something  very  wrong, 
so,  instantly,  one  hand  reached  for  the  lever  that 
closed  a  gate  across  the  roadway  and  the  other  hand 
instantly  set  in  motion  the  mechanism  that  started 
the  bridge  upward,  and  thus  the  car,  desperately 
braked,  and  skidding,  was  stopped. 

And  there  comes  to  mind  the  homely  comment  of 
a  Chicago  paragrapher  upon  a  labored  editorial  of 
a  famous  New  York  editor,  who  loves  lengthily  to 
plummet  the  abstruse;  this  editorial  he  worked  out 
with  more  than  usual  labor  and  argument  to  the 
triumphant  conclusion  that  * '  Therefore,  the  egg  came 
before  the  hen  or  else  a  miracle  happened";  upon 
which  the  uncobwebbed  paragraphical  comment  was 
the  brief  but  overwhelming, ' l  No,  the  egg  came  after 
the  hen  or  else  a  miracle  happened." 


21 


CHAPTER  III 


WE   WILL,   GO   AND   GET   THEM 

HICAGO  cares  noth- 
ing for  grandfathers. 
It  is  not  a  city  of  an- 
cestor worship.  It  is 
not  a  city  of  descend- 
ants, for  the  very  idea  of 
descent  is  repugnant  to  all 
for  which  Chicago  stands. 
A  descendant  is  one  who 
goes  down,  and  Chicago- 
ans  will  not  admit  the 
thought.  A  descendant  is 
one  who,  descending,  looks 
back  at  lofty  peaks.  But 
the  ascendant — and  every  Chicagoan  is  or  hopes  to 
be  an  ascendant! — looks  forward,  as  he  climbs,  to 
brilliant  heights — although  the  literal  minded  may 
object  to  the  use  of  such  terms  in  regard  to  this  city 
of  absolute  level.  And  this  is  one  of  the  delightful 
contradictions :  that,  with  every  citizen  on  the  same 
level,  all  are-  climbing.  The  vital  and  important 
matter,  in  regard  to  any  Chicagoan,  is  not  what  his 
grandfather  did,  or  who  his  grandfather  was,  but 
what  he  himself  is  now  doing  to  advance  himself  and 

22 


"WE  WILL  GO  AND  GET  THEM" 

the  city — the  two  interests  being  deemed  to  be  the 
same. 

But  although  the  present  outweighs  the  past,  there 
is,  -at  the  same  time,  an  unusual  degree  of  present- 
day  interest  in  the  events  of  the  past.  I  do  not  know 
of  any  other  city  where  the  local  historical  museum 
is  considered  to  be  a  matter  of  such  importance  and 
worthy  the  close  attention  of  the  most  advanced  men 
and  women.  And  though  ancestry  is  subordinated 
to  present-day  achievement,  ancestry  combined  with 
present-day  achievement  may  be  highly  regarded. 

A  politician  would  like,  if  he  could,  to  claim 
descent  from  the  first  Irishman  of  Chicago,  who  came 
in  1830.  And  any  citizen  would  like,  as  a  matter  of 
pride  and  interest,  to  be  able  to  point  to  his  father's 
or  grandfather's  name  on  that  first  formal  tax  roll 
of  the  little  place,  of  1825,  when  the  property  was 
valued  at  $4707  and  the  total  tax  was  fixed  at  $47.07 
and  apportioned  among  thirteen  taxpayers.  And  so 
recent  is  that  date,  that  until  a  few  years  past  a  few 
Chicagoans  could  claim  a  birth-date  antecedent  to 
that  of  the  tax-roll. 

One  of  the  most  interesting  visitors  to  the  World's 
Fair,  in  1893,  was  a  charming  lady,  under  sixty,  who, 
her  home  then  being  in  the  South,  was  the  invited 
guest  of  the  city  because  she  was  a  Kinzie,  descended 
from  the  earliest  and  most  important  of  settler 
families.  She  was  so  closely  connected  with  the  past 
that  when  she  died,  so  recently  as  1917,  and  then 
only  82  years  old,  she  had  for  years  enjoyed  the  dis- 
tinction of  being  the  oldest  living  white  child  born 

23 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

here.  Her  face  looks  out,  charming  ir  its  sweetness 
and  youth,  from  a  portrait  of  1856,  ;:-y  Healy,  the 
painter  who  put  Chicago  on  canvas.  And  it  is  such 
dates  and  the  realization  of  the  dates  which  point 
out  the  extraordinary  recentness  of  old  Chicago. 
There  are  a  number  of  Chicagoans,  some  ten  in  all, 
still  alive  as  I  write,  who  were  born  here  previous 
to  1840.  There  are  business  houses  still  in  existence 
which  date  back  as  far  as  the  incorporation  of  Chi- 
cago as  a  city.  The  yesterday  of  Chicago  is  thus 
to-day;  or,  as  a  practical  philosopher  put  it,  to-day  is 
the  to-morrow  that  we  were  wondering  about  yester- 
day. 

In  an  effort  to  connect  Chicago  with  the  men  of 
the  Revolution  some  have  claimed,  and  the  story  is 
once  in  a  while  repeated,  that  George  Washington 
once  remarked  to  Anthony  Wayne  that  at  the  mouth 
of  the  Chicago  was  to  arise  one  of  the  great  cities 
of  the  future.  Benjamin  Franklin  really  did  say 
that  about  the  mouth  of  the  Cuyahoga,  where  Cleve- 
land has  since  risen,  and  he  was  thoughtful  enough 
to  put  it  on  paper,  and  Chicago  would  fain  do  better 
than  Cleveland  in  the  way  of  prophecy.  But  no- 
body really  believes  the  Washington  tale;  and  Chi- 
cagoans prefer  to  point  out,  with  a  laugh,  the  place 
where  Washington  would  have  had  his  headquarters 
had  he  ever  come  to  Chicago. 

Chicago  does  not  need  visionary  associations  with 
the  past.  Not  only  is  there  the  Battle  Roll  of  Tip- 
pecanoe — and  it  is  a  striking  fact  that  Chicago 
names  should  figure  as  prominently  as  they  do  in 

24 


"WE  WILL  GO  AND  GET  THEM" 

the  story  of  that  brilliantly  fought  battle  of  1811— 
but  there  was  also  the  little  Black  Hawk  War,  which 
made  Chicago  a  center  of  importance  for  a  time,  and 
which  had  the  participation  of  many  men  of  future 
prominence.  All  were  in  Chicago  as  much  as  they 
could  be,  for  small  though  it  was  it  was  full  of  life. 
And  it  ought  to  be  remembered  that  Chicago,  though 
really  but  a  village,  organized  and  sent  out  four  com- 
panies to  the  war. 

Among  the  future  great  men  was  Zachary  Taylor, 
afterwards  to  be  President,  and  he  was  in  Chicago 
as  lieutenant-colonel.  Abraham  Lincoln  was  here  as 
captain  of  volunteers.  And  Jefferson  Davis  was  in 
the  war,  and  in  Chicago,  as  lieutenant  in  the  regular 
army.  Likely  enough,  Davis  and  Lincoln  passed 
each  other  on  the  muddy  road  beside  Fort  Dearborn, 
which  stood  near  the  mouth  of  the  river:  and  it  is 
curious  to  think  how  little  either  of  them  thought  of 
the  conflict,  then  thirty  years  away,  in  which  they 
were  to  be  opposing  leaders  and  Presidents. 

A  half  century  after  the  Black  Hawk  War — in 
1881,  to  be  precise — Jefferson  Davis  was  again  in 
Chicago.  He  was  on  his  way  from  New  Orleans  to 
Montreal,  and  stopped  over,  in  Chicago,  to  see  the 
Duke  of  Sutherland,  who  was  passing  through :  and, 
as  the  English  reporter  expressed  it,  in  his  story 
(it  was  Eussell,  of  the  London  Times),  Davis  sent 
word  that  "he.  would  be  glad  to  pay  his  respects  to 
the  Duke  of  Sutherland,  if  His  Grace  would  receive 
him."  I  should  not  like  to  think  that  an  American 
who  had  made,  though  on  the  wrong  side,  a  great 

25 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

figure  in  our  national  life,  really  sent  a  message  thus 
phrased;  and,  indeed,  Eussell  as  a  correspondent 
was  never  to  be  altogether  trusted,  especially  when 
"Your  Gracing.'*  But  he  was  probably  right  when 
he  described  Jefferson  Davis  as  being  at  this  time 
almost  white-haired,  with  close-cut  beard  and 
mustache.  On  the  very  day  of  the  call  of  Jefferson 
Davis  on  the  duke,  Chicagoans  were  setting  in  place 
a  memorial  tablet  on  the  site  of  Fort  Dearborn,  and 
the  Times  man  makes  Davis  say  that  he  had  once 
been  in  command  of  the  fort :  a  statement  which,  of 
course,  Jefferson  Davis  could  not  have  made,  as  he 
was  never  in  command  at  Fort  Dearborn,  but  was 
for  a  time  in  command  of  another  fort,  Winnebago, 
in  Wisconsin. 

Another  lieutenant  who  was  here,  for  the  Black 
Hawk  War — like  Davis,  a  dapper  West  Pointer — 
was  Robert  Anderson;  and  when,  long  afterwards, 
after  his  defense  of  Fort  Sumter,  he  met  President 
Lincoln,  and  was  asked  by  him  if  he  remembered 
their  first  meeting,  Anderson  replied  that  he  did  not 
remember  ever  having  met  him  before,  whereupon, 
slowly,  the  tall,  sad  man  replied,  ' '  Thirty  years  ago, 
you  mustered  me  into  service  in  the  Black  Hawk 
War."  How  such  essences  and  flavors  of  history 
add  delight  to  a  region!  And  how  whimsically  de- 
lightful, among  other  historical  memories,  was  the 
great  contrast  between  Lincoln  and  Douglas,  be- 
tween the  giant  Lincoln  and  the  "little  giant"  Doug- 
las, between  "six  feet  four  and  four  feet  six"  as 
Chicagoans  like  to  express  it ;  and  Lincoln  was  really 

26 


BEAUTY  AND  BUSINESS 


OF  THE 
UHWERSITY  OF  ILUNOIS 


"WE  WILL  GO  AND  GET  THEM" 

well  over  six  feet  and  Douglas  was  barely  more  than 
five. 

It  was  in  Chicago  that  Lincoln  was  nominated  for 
the  first  time  for  the  Presidency ;  and  this  is  remind- 
ful of  the  proud  record  of  Chicago  for  national  po- 
litical conventions  and  of  the  general  success  of  Chi- 
cago-made candidates.  And  what,  Chicagoans  ask, 
can  New  York  show,  in  the  matter  of  such  conven- 
tions, and  the  national  leadership  that  they 
represent? 

Grover  Cleveland  was  nominated  in  this  city  for 
the  two  times  that  he  was  successful  in  the  Presi- 
dential race,  leaving  to  St.  Louis  the  unenviable  dis- 
tinction of  nomination  for  failure.  Benjamin  Har- 
rison was  nominated  here  for  his  winning  campaign, 
and  it  was  a  Minneapolis  nomination  from  which  he 
went  down  in  defeat.  Roosevelt  was  nominated 
here  for  victory;  and  if  he  was  afterwards  given  a 
nomination  here  for  defeat,  it  was  for  an  election  at 
which  it  was  another  Chicago  nominee,  Taft,  who 
won.  And  this  gave  Chicago  the  chance,  which  it 
cheerfully  seized,  of  putting  an  addendum  to  a  popu- 
lar pleasantry.  For  Chicagoans  had  loved  the 
simple  humor  of  the  story  of  the  two  citizens  dis- 
puting as  to  the  merits  of  the  at  one  time  contem- 
poraneous Illinois  Senators,  Mason  and  Cullom;  of 
Cullom's  giving  up  his  seat  in  a  street  car  to  a  lady 
and  Mason's  giving  up  his  seat  to  two  ladies:  and 
now  that  Taft  had,  in  an  important  sense,  joined  the 
Chicago  political  family,  he  was  made  to  give  up  his 
seat  to  three  ladies. 

27 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

It  was  here  in  Chicago  that  Harding  was  nomi- 
nated. Hughes  was  nominated  here  for  his  unsuc- 
cessful race.  Bryan  was  given  his  first  nomination 
here,  and  here  it  was  that  he  electrified  the  country 
and  leaped  to  fame  as  an  orator  with  his  perorative 
crucifixion  and  cross  of  gold.  Grant  was  nominated 
in  Chicago  for  his  first  election;  and  it  was  here 
that  this  mighty  son  of  Illinois  made  the  third  term 
effort  which  so  bitterly  aroused  national  feeling. 
But  how  superbly  the  effort  was  made,  with  the  hold- 
ing together,  throughout  two  days  and  thirty-six 
ballots,  of  the  unbroken  and  unbreakable  Three 
Hundred!  The  blood  stirs  with  the  thrill  of  that 
battle;  and  those  Three  Hundred  might  well  be 
versified  by  some  American  Tennyson,  even  though 
they  went  down  to  defeat  in  a  wrong  cause,  but  as 
it  is,  the  only  verse  in  connection  with  it,  I  believe, 
is  that  which,  declaimed  by  Conkling  in  his  nomi- 
nating speech,  aroused  the  delegates  and  spectators 
to  wild  acclaim : 

"And  when  asked  what  State  he  hails  from, 
Our  sole  reply  shall  be, 
He  hails  from  Appomatox 
And  its  famous  apple  tree." 

Garfield  was  nominated  for  a  winning  election  in 
Chicago.  McKinley  received  in  Chicago  the  nomi- 
nation for  his  first  election.  And  it  was  in  Chicago 
that  Blaine  was  nominated,  when  Robert  G.  Inger- 
soll,  that  orator  of  Illinois,  always  associated  with 
Chicago  in  the  mind  of  Easterners,  won  a  mag- 

28 


"WE  WILL  GO  AND  GET  THEM" 

nificent  oratorical  triumph  with  the  speech  in  which 
the  outstanding  phrase  was  that  in  which  Blaine  was 
personified  as  the  Plumed  Knight. 

And  all  at  once,  at  this  thought,  the  misty  years 
roll  away,  and  the  site  of  the  future  Chicago  is  seen, 
in  the  light  of  two  centuries  before  that  speech,  as 
literally  aglow  with  the  armor  and  glory  and  cos- 
tumes and  plumes  of  literal  knights. 

The  word  "Chicago,"  has  come  down  through  the 
centuries  almost  unchanged,  in  the  effort  to  repro- 
duce Indian  pronunciation:  "Chicajo,"  Chacha- 
jou,"  "Chekegou,"  "Chassagoac."  The  word 
meant,  in  the  Indian  tongue,  "strong";  assuredly 
an  admirable  word  to  characterize  the  city  that  was 
to  be.  The  "strong,"  some  have  suggested,  came 
from  the  prevalent  wild  onion ;  others  think  it  came 
from  the  quite  as  prevalent  swamp-cabbage.  It 
would  seem,  more  probably,  that  the  word  came  from 
the  name  of  a  great  Indian  chief,  if  the  chief  did  not 
take  his  name  from  the  locality.  "Chicagou"  was 
an  Indian  chief  who  went  to  Paris  in  the  reign  of 
Louis  the  Fifteenth,  about  1725,  and  it  was  set  down 
in  early  annals,  by  one  of  the  French  priests,  that 
the  chief  was  given  a  splendid  snuff-box  by  the 
Duchess  of  Orleans;  a  sufficiently  odd  feature  to  be 
the  outstanding  reminiscence  of  a  curious  visit. 

There  was  a  Chikagou  or  Chassagoac,  a  chief  on 
Lake  Michigan,  some  half  a  century  before  that; 
and  it  may  be  taken  as  probable  that  the  first  chief 
of  that  name  was  the  father  of  the  second,  although, 
as  no  ages  are  mentioned,  they  may  have  been  one 

29 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

and  the  same;  remindful  of  the  two  skulls  of  St. 
Peter  shown  to  the  tourist  in  Rome,  one  of  the  saint 
when  he  was  a  young  man  and  one  when  he  was  old. 

At  any  rate,  the  great  La  Salle,  most  picturesque, 
most  daring  and  most  romantic  of  the  wonderful 
Frenchmen  who  plunged  far  through  the  Western 
wilderness  while  the  English  colonists  were  still  hug- 
ging close  to  the  Atlantic  coast,  had  long  conferences 
with  Chassagoac,  as  he  understood  the  name,  the 
then  great  chief  of  the  Illinois  country.  He  was 
known  by  name  quite  as  early  as  was  the  Chicago 
Portage ;  and  it  is  therefore  probable  that  the  local- 
ity was  given  its  name  from  him.  And  the  prob- 
ability is  greatly  strengthened  by  the  reference,  by 
Father  Marquette,  to  a  chief  Chachagwession  at  the 
southern  end  of  Lake  Michigan. 

La  Salle  and  Chassagoac  talked  much  together,  on 
the  shores  of  the  lake,  and  together  they  made  the 
first  trade  agreement  of  Chicago,  the  scene  of  what 
myriad  of  trade  agreements  since!  And,  indeed, 
one  sees  that  romance  and  trade  went  hand  in  hand 
in  the  beginnings  of  Chicago,  just  as  they  have  con- 
tinued to  do. 

Chassagoac  and  La  Salle  agreed  together  upon  the 
exchange  of  furs  for  merchandise,  and  La  Salle  con- 
summated the  agreement  by  handing  to  the  Indian 
— with  such  delightful  detail  has  the  story  come 
down — some  hatchets,  some  knives,  one  kettle,  one 
red  blanket.  How  absolutely  delightful  to  know 
that  it  was  red !  And  the  first  business  agreement 

30 


"WE  WILL  GO  AND  GET  THEM" 

of  Chicago  had  thus  to  do  with  hardware  and  dry- 
goods  and  furs. 

La  Salle  wrote  from  here  to  the  Governor-General 
of  Canada  a  letter  dated,  "Du  portage  de  Checagon 
4  Juin,  1683."  And  in  the  winter  of  1682-3  he  built 
here  a  log  house  and  a  stockade — vanished  long, 
long  ago. 

Another  chief  of  the  Chicago  region,  or  the  same 
chief  with  the  name  somewhat  altered  by  the  priestly 
chronicler  (after  all,  names  were  necessarily  set 
down  by  sound,  and  the  excellent  priest  may  have 
been  a  little  deaf  in  one  ear),  declared  that  in  the 
course  of  his  life ;  a  life,  as  he  said,  of  long  wars  and 
great  affairs;  he  had  known  but  three  great  cap- 
tains: Monsieur  La  Salle,  Monsieur  de  Frontenac 
and  himself.  And  never  was  there  a  more  typical 
Chicago  declaration! 

Naivete  is  a  cheerful  characteristic  of  Chicago. 
Turning  over  the  pages  of  a  Chicago  book,  I  noticed 
a  street  view,  a  view  of  Monroe  Street,  with  a  note 
stating  that  it  was  from  an  old  engraving,  "in  the 
eighties"!  I  think  that  no  other  city,  young  or  old, 
could  so  naturally  refer  to  the  eighties  as  "old." 
For,  of  course,  being  a  street  scene  of  Chicago,  it 
was  necessarily  to  the  eighteen  eighties  that  it  re- 
ferred, and  not  to  the  seventeen  eighties,  when 
George  Eogers  Clark  had  just  completed  the  heroic 
campaign  that  not  only  gave  the  Northwest  Terri- 
tory to  the  United  States,  but,  as  another  result, 
brought  about  the  setting  aside  of  school  lands,  still 

31 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

owned  by  the  city  of  Chicago,  from  whose  rentals 
a  considerable  part  of  the  daily  expenses  of  the 
present-day  public  schools  is  secured :  a  most  curious 
connection  with  romantic  bravery  of  the  past. 

Nor  did  that  "old"  picture  of  Chicago  mean  the 
sixteen  eighties,  the  period  of  the  glorious  La  SaUe, 
who  first  reached  Lake  Michigan  in  1679  and  whose 
deeds  and  personality  dominated  the  Chicago  and 
Illinois  region  till  his  death,  less  than  ten  years 
later,  in  1687. 

The  history  of  Chicago  has  a  background  of  proud 
memories  and  picturesque  tradition.  Nor  does  this 
mean  that  picturesqueness  can  belong  only  to  the 
distant  past.  Chicago  of  the  present  may  at  any 
moment  offer  picturesqueness,  and  the  picturesque- 
ness  may  be  very  fine  indeed ;  as  on  a  day  during  the 
strike  of  April,  1920,  when  fifteen  hundred  striking 
carpenters  of  Chicago  marched  to  Melrose  Park,  a 
suburb  that  had  suffered  devastation  from  a  hurri- 
cane, and  worked  all  day  at  building  and  repairing, 
gladly  giving  their  labor  free.  Those  fifteen  hun- 
dred men,  marching  and  working  without  pomp  or 
display,  make  a  fine  and  memorable  picture. 

This  city,  young  though  it  is,  is  also  a  city  of  age, 
and  of  pictorial  age.  "Winds  come  blowing,  straight 
from  the  land  of  romance.  One  thinks  again  of  the 
days  of  La  Salle.  What  costumes  and  what  finery, 
here  at  the  mouth  of  the  Chicago !  The  noble  ban- 
ners, the  white  fleur-de-lis,  steel  corslets  flashing 
in  the  sun,  leather  jerkins,  colorful  scarfs,  gallant 
plumes!  And,  in  picturesque  contrast,  the  priestly 

32 


"WE  WILL  GO  AND  GET  THEM" 

robes  of  black  or  gray.  We  see  La  Salle  himself, 
not  like  his  ineffective  statue  in  Lincoln  Park,  but 
splendid  and  stern,  in  steel  breastplate  and  with 
belted  baldric  and  sword;  we  see  him  in  a  scarlet 
cloak  with  gold  facings,  a  figure  noble  and  superb; 
we  see  him,  in  the  pages  of  another  chronicler,  in 
scarlet  cloak  thick-edged  with  gold,  a  man  of  scarlet 
gorgeousness.  And  he  had  a  costume  of  white  and 
gold  which  he  donned  only  for  occasions  of  special 
impressiveness  and  display.  A  stately,  command- 
ing, always  effectively  clad  figure,  there  in  the  dis- 
tant wilderness,  La  Salle  appreciated  to  the  full,  as 
George  Washington  later  appreciated,  the  value  of 
finely-clad  dignity. 

The  purple  and  gold  of  chivalry,  the  strange  and 
haunting  scenes,  the  devotion  of  friend  to  friend,  the 
magnificent  enterprise,  the  gay  bravery,  the  instant 
readiness  to  engage  in  either  battle  or  barter,  the 
personal  bravery  of  those  early  men,  the  marvelous 
things  they  attempted  and  performed ! 

Near  Niagara  La  Salle  built  a  ship,  Le  Griffon, 
and  it  was  the  first  to  sail  into  the  waters  of  Lake 
Michigan.  At  Green  Bay  he  loaded  it  with  furs. 
It  set  out  upon  its  Eastward  way.  And  the  imagi- 
nation is  instantly  aflame  with  the  picture  of  that 
boat,  the  first  sail  boat  on  Lake  Michigan,  setting  out 
to  return  through  the  profound  loneliness. 

A  little  later  and  La  Salle,  at  the  Chicago  Portage, 
begins  to  be  disquieted  from  receiving  no  news  of 
his  vessel,  for  a  great  storm  had  swept  the  lake 
shortly  after  it  set  sail.  A  little  later  still,  he  makes 

33 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

up  his  mind  that  his  boat  was  lost  in  the  storm. 
And  in  an  effort  to  make  sure  he  resorts  to  a  plan 
which  even  now,  with  all  the  appliances  of  these 
recent  days,  with  steam  and  electricity,  railroads 
and  telegraph,  would  be  a  difficult  plan  to  carry  out. 
For,  to  find  if  his  boat  was  wrecked,  and  to  find  if 
survivors  needed  aid,  he  had  the  entire  coast  line  of 
Lake  Michigan  searched!  But  no  wreck  or  wreck- 
age was  discovered,  and  the  boat  was  never  again 
heard  of. 

The  loss  of  his  ship  was  a  great  blow  to  La  Salle ; 
to  his  finances  as  well  as  to  his  ambitions.  For  this 
splendid  knight,  this  gallant  soldier,  was  first  of  all 
a  trader.  He  had  been  given  a  trading  grant  and 
privileges  by  the  French  government,  and  owned  a 
trading  station  on  the  St.  Lawrence,  and  depended 
on  his  profits  in  trade.  And  that  represents  the 
Chicago  of  to-day:  picturesqueness  and  trade!  La 
Salle  could  not  have  given  the  locality  a  better  be- 
ginning. Not,  it  may  be  added,  that  he  was  con- 
nected with  the  Chicago  Portage  alone,  for  he  was 
up  and  down  throughout  the  entire  Illinois  country ; 
but  he  was  always  returning  to  the  Portage,  and 
passing  through  by  way  of  the  Portage,  and  his  mind 
was  a  great  deal  upon  the  Portage.  Business  and 
imagination  was  the  keynote  of  the  life  of  Chicago, 
as  it  was  the  keynote  of  the  life  of  La  Salle :  Rene 
Robert  Cavalier,  Sieur  de  La  Salle — and  what  a  fine 
and  rolling  and  satisfactory  name  it  is ! 

La  Salle 's  greatest  friend  was  an  Italian-born 
trader,  the  great  Tonti :  and  a  connection  altogether 

34 


"WE  WILL  GO  AND  GET  THEM" 

bizarre  links  the  name  with  the  modern  business  of 
modern  days:  for  Tonti 's  father  was  an  insurance 
man,  who  was  so  clever  as  to  invent,  in  those  far- 
away times,  a  form  of  insurance  still  known,  from 
his  name,  as  the  Tontine ! 

When  La  Salle  and  Tonti  were  apart  they  would 
write  each  other  in  letters  tucked  in  the  crotches  of 
trees,  or  left  hanging  to  branches,  to  be  found  by 
the  intended  recipient  weeks  or  months  afterwards. 

While  the  English  were  laboriously  exploring  a 
few  miles  up  the  Delaware  beyond  Philadelphia,  or 
cautiously  treading  the  Bay  Path,  out  toward  the 
Berkshires,  Frenchmen  became  closely  familiar 
with  thousands  of  miles  of  wilderness  from  Quebec 
to  beyond  the  future  Chicago.  The  name  of  one  of 
them,  Du  Lhut,  is  retained  in  the  name  of  the  city 
at  the  head  of  Lake  Superior.  Marquette  and  Joliet 
are  remembered  by  the  cities  of  those  names.  Tonti 
is  kept  in  memory  by  a  romantic  modern  little  vil- 
lage, Tontitown,  with  a  romantic  history,  that  I  once 
came  upon,  tucked  away  in  the  Ozark  Mountains. 
The  name  of  La  Salle  is  the  name  of  a  town  not  many 
miles  from  Chicago ;  but,  even  more  fittingly,  man  of 
adventurous  finance  that  he  was,  his  name  has  been 
given  to  the  street  which  is  the  Wall  Street  of  Chi- 
cago. 

What  journeys  those  early  Frenchmen  made! 
They  would  travel  thousands  of  miles,  unchecked  by 
blazing  sun  or  bitter  cold,  by  plumping  rains  or 
sweeping  sleet  or  snow.  And  how  they  reveled  in 
the  beauty  of  long  and  lovely  days!  What  delight 

35 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

was  theirs  in  the  charming  sweeps  of  plain,  the  dark 
solemnity  of  the-  forests ! 

La  Salle  went  on  a  visit  to  France ;  and  at  length, 
to  Tonti,  in  the  Illinois  country,  came  a  rumor  that 
his  friend,  bound  again  for  America,  had  been 
wrecked  on  the  coast  of  Florida.  Instantly  Tonti 
prepared  to  cross  the  immensity  of  wilderness  that 
lay  between  Lake  Michigan  and  Florida,  to  seek  for 
and  succor  his  friend;  but,  as  he  was  starting — and 
the  imagination  is  appalled  by  the  intended  effort—' 
there  came  the  news  that  it  was  not  on  the  Florida 
coast  but  near  the  mouth  of  the  Mississippi  that 
La  Salle  needed  him;  and  so  down  the  Mississippi 
he  went,  following  its  bends  and  sweeps  for  vast 
mileages,  and  at  the  river's  mouth  he  sought  for 
La  Salle  but  sought  in  vain,  and  at  length  he  re- 
turned, heavy-hearted  and  sorely  anxious. 

La  Salle  was  really  in  trouble,  on  the  Mexican 
Gulf,  but  far  to  the  westward  of  the  Mississippi's 
mouth;  and  he  started  for  Illinois  and  Tonti,  with 
his  party,  striking  across  country,  attempting  the 
impossible.  He  was  slain  on  the  way  by  a  traitor, 
and  thus  came  to  an  end  the  wonderful  friendship  of 
two  wonderful  men. 

It  is  well  for  Chicagoans  to  remember  La  Salle; 
every  Chicagoan  ought  by  the  vision  splendid  to 
be  on  his  way  attended.  And  especially  because, 
by  some  miracle  of  transference,  of  transmission, 
the  spell  which  La  Salle  cast  over  the  region  of 
Chicago  has  outlasted  the  centuries.  La  Salle  was  a 
Norman.  And  the  ancient  Norman  prayer  was: 

36 


"WE  WILL  GO  AND  GET  THEM" 

"Lord,  we  do  not  ask  thee  for  the  desirable  things 
of  life,  but  merely  to  tell  us  where  they  are  and  we 
will  go  and  get  them."  And  that  ancient  Norman 
spirit,  exemplified  so  magnificently  by  La  Salle,  is 
the  very  spirit  of  Chicago  to-day. 


37 


CHAPTER  IV 


THE   LAKE   FBOETT 

LMOST  alone  among  great 
cities,  quite  alone  among 
cities  of  the  first  im- 
portance in  size, 
Chicago  faces  directly 
out  upon  a  mighty  sea 
— a  sea  that  is  mighty  although  it 
is  an  inland  sea.  Homes  and  busi- 
ness blocks  look  off  into  the  blue 
and  purple  distances,  across  bound- 
lessness of  watery  space;  and  the 
water  shimmers  and  swirls  and 
ripples,  or  comes  thundering  in  huge  breakers, 
directly  in  front  of  beautiful  homes  and  stately 
mercantile  structures.  From  the  windows,  one  may 
look  out  at  water  and  sky  of  ever-changing  colors, 
at  a  lake  of  cold  yellow  under  clouds  of  purplish 
black,  at  a  lake  all  blue  under  the  bluest  of  skies, 
at  a  lake  of  dazzling  white  and  green.  The  city 
faces  out  right  royally.  And  sunrise  is  a  marvel, 
when  it  suffuses  the  frontage  with  showered  gold. 
Or  one  watches  the  evening  colorings  after  the  sun 
has  set,  with  opalescent  blues  and  steel  grays,  with 
shifting  shadowings,  weird,  uncanny,  beautiful,  till 

38 


THE  LAKE  FBONT 

the  darkness  deepens  all  into  one  black  mass.    Or, 
as  one  of  the  Chicago  poets  expresses  it, 

"The  fog  comes 
On  little  cat  feet. 
It  sits  looking 
over  harbor  and  city 
on  silent  haunches 
and  then  moves  on." 

But  it  is  told  in  all  earnestness,  and  not  in  jest, 
that  a  visiting  Englishman,  looking  out  over  the 
view,  from  his  hotel  window,  on  his  first  morning 
here,  remarked  casually,  how  odd  it  was  to  have  a 
reservoir  in  front  of  a  hotel ! 

Although  there  is  a  lake  frontage  of  some  twenty- 
six  miles,  the  term  "Lake  Front "  is  used,  by 
Chicagoans,  as  descriptive  of  about  a  mile  of  Michi- 
gan Avenue;  and  it  is  one  of  the  most  wonderful 
city  miles  of  the  world.  The  mile  holds  shops  and 
office  buildings,  clubs  and  hotels,  built  closely  and 
massively  and  with  splendid  effect,  and  facing  out, 
across  a  superb  roadway,  to  the  water. 

A  line  of  massive  buildings ;  square-topped,  gable- 
topped,  tower-topped.  Buildings  of  gray  and  of 
ivory-white,  of  red  and  brown,  in  varying  shades. 
Buildings  of  twentieth-century  design  contrasting 
with  buildings  quite  as  modern  but  following  old- 
time  appearance.  There  are  little  balconies,  and 
there  are  human  figures  in  bronze  or  stone  and  there 
are  shields  of  stone.  There  are  oval  windows,  stone 
garlanded,  and  there  are  lions'  heads  and  eagles  in 
stone.  A  Diana  surmounts  a  lofty  tower:  a  stone 

39 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

owl,  gravely  apexed,  tops  a  superbly  designed  club 
building,  a  tall  and  spacious  building,  Gothic  in 
design  in  infinite  detail,  with  balconies  and  oriel 
windows.  Another  club  building  displays,  up 
under  its  cornice  line,  a  chariot-race  frieze.  An- 
other club  building  shows  the  stateliiiess  of  tall 
Gothic  windows. 

But  not  for  a  moment  is  it  forgotten,  that  it  is 
not  the  buildings  alone  or  the  lake  alone,  but  the 
combination  of  the  buildings,  and  the  lake  and  the 
boulevarded  avenue,  and  the  space  between  the 
avenue  and  the  lake,  that  makes  the  magnificence 
of  this  one-sided  thoroughfare.  For  all  these  busi- 
ness blocks  and  club  buildings  and  hotels  occupy  one 
side  only  of  Michigan  Avenue ;  all  face  the  lake  and 
the  rising  sun,  across  the  open  space,  known  as 
Grant  Park,  which  is  definitely  planned  not  to  inter- 
cept the  view  but  to  give  it  a  formal  setting  and 
extension,  while  at  the  same  time  masking  the  rail- 
way. 

One-sided  avenues  are  a  feature  of  beauty,  a 
feature  of  distinguished  importance,  in  various 
cities  of  the  world.  There  is  remarkable  Princes 
Street  in  Edinburgh,  looking  far  across  at  the  line 
of  the  ancient  town  and  the  castled  rock;  there  is 
Blva  degli  'Schiavoni,  facing  out  across  the  water 
in  still  more  ancient  Venice ;  there  is  the  Lungarno, 
bordering  the  yellow  river  of  Florence;  there  is 
Beacon  Street,  facing  with  modest  pride  over  Boston 
Common;  there  is  Riverside  Drive,  with  its  superb 
view  of  the  Hudson;  and  with  all  these  one-sided 

40 


THE  LAKE  FRONT 

thoroughfares  of  beauty,  some  of  them  with  many 
centuries  behind  them,  the  new  and  the  noble  one- 
side  avenue  of  Chicago  proudly  holds  its  own. 

Nor  is  it  that  all  the  buildings  are  beautiful,  but 
that  throughout  the-  Mile  the  effectiveness  is  con- 
tinued and  beautiful.  There  is  constant  collective 
beauty;  and  some  of  the  buildings  are  of  striking 
individual  beauty.  There  is  wide  variety;  and 
Chicagoans  themselves  like  to  point  out,  for  ex- 
ample, the  Fine  Arts  Building,  and  to  say  that  the 
first  story  is  of  Roman  architecture,  the  second 
Greek,  the  third  Greco-Roman,  and  the  fourth  catch- 
as-catch-can. 

Housed  in  these  buildings  are  big  clubs  and  little 
clubs,  and  other  organizations,  largely  literary  or 
musical.  One  has  the  hall  of  the  city's  orchestra. 
There  are  shops  for  jewels  and  laces  and  furs  and 
pictures,  for  fine  raiment  and  fine  linen.  There  are 
hotels  of  world-wide  fame.  There  are  business 
buildings  with  mighty  and  massive  pillars.  There 
are  buildings  that  rise  in  airy  strength.  There  are 
doorways  of  diversity,  including  one  that  is 
Egyptian,  like  a  cave.  You  see  long  balconies,  and 
little  single-window  balconies,  and  buildings  with 
no  balconies  at  all.  You  catch  sight,  far  up,  of  a 
Venetian  gable. 

Within  one  of  the  buildings  is  a  swimming  place, 
a  great  pool  within  surroundings  of  white  marble; 
and  hard-headed  business  men  order  luncheon  be- 
fore their  noonday  plunge,  and  have  it  served,  if 
they  so  desire,  on  little  tables  beside  the  pools,  and 

41 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

feel  a  restfulness  from  eating,  clad  only  in  breech- 
clouts,  and  in  a  little  while,  impeccably  dressed, 
hurry  off  to  their  business  again. 

The  great  broad  sidewalk,  the  superb  breadth  of 
the  street,  the  throngs  of  the  well-dressed  (for 
seldom  do  the  other  classes  venture  upon  the  Mile), 
the  constant  streams  of  motor-cars  (not  trolley- 
cars;  nothing  so  common  as  that!),  give  an  air  of 
vivid  life,  as  of  a  city  aglow  with  wealth  and  happi- 
ness. 

At  the  northern  end,  in  the  space  between  the 
driveway  and  the  lake,  an  imposing  peristyle,  still 
new  enough  to  be  almost  white,  gives  dignity  and 
beauty,  like  a  bit  of  ancient  Greece,  with  its  classic 
columns  and  its  sweeping  grace  and  its  nobility  of 
size  and  proportions. 

Set  stately  between  avenue  and  water  's-edge, 
stands  the  Art  Institute,  a  building  of  dark-mel- 
lowed stone,  with  'broad-stairwayed  entrance  and 
lions  of  bronze. 

The  long  terraces,  the  stone  balustrades,  the  spac- 
ing and  spaciousness,  all  are  part  of  a  splendid 
plan,  splendidly  carried  out.  But  also,  between  the 
avenue  and  the  lake,  stretch  the  sunken  tracks  of  a 
railway,  out  of  sight  but  not  out  of  mind,  for  there 
is  constant  noise  and  there  are  constant  clouds  of 
blackest  smoke  and  blackest  soot,  shriveling  the 
grass  and  shrinking  the  shrubs  that  the  city  bravely 
tries  to  grow. 

The  space  between  roadway  and  water,  given 
nobility  at  one  end  of  the  Mile  by  the  peristyle, 

42 


THE  LAKE  FRONT 

and  beauty  midway  by  the  Art  Institute,  has  at  its 
southern  end  the  Field  Museum  of  Natural  History. 

This  is  of  tremendous  size,  of  classic  design,  with 
mighty  rows  of  mighty  pillars  along  the  central 
facade  and  the  mighty  wings.  It  is  said  to  be  the 
largest  marble  building  in  the  world :  seven  hundred 
and  sixty-seven  feet  long,  if  one  cares  precisely  to 
know,  and  three  hundred  and  fifty  in  width.  It  is 
hugely  Grecian.  It  is  a  royal  palace.  And  yet  in 
spite  of  its  immensity  of  perfection,  it  lacks  some 
spirit  and  leaves  one  rather  cold. 

The  boulevarded  Mile  of  Michigan  Avenue — the 
Chicagoans  lovingly  call  it  their  "Boul'  Mich." — is 
as  impressive  by  night  as  by  day;  when  darkness 
comes  creeping  in  from  the  lake,  and  the  boulevard 
lightens  and  brightens,  with  the  flare  of  thousands 
of  motors,  with  the  glow  of  lighted  windows,  with 
the  splendor  of  lines  of  illumination  from  six- 
clustered  lights  on  metal  poles,  when  everything  is 
seen  in  a  glorified  indistinctness,  with  the  beauty  of 
buildings  and  roadway  idealized,  and  with  a  sort  of 
magic  in  it  all. 

Yet  it  was  hard  to  induce  business  and  buildings 
to  come  here  until  a  few  years  ago ;  and  even  now, 
at  the  end  of  the  Mile,  to  the  southward,  the  beauty 
ends,  and  there  comes  suddenly  a  garishness,  as 
of  a  mining  camp,  with  two-story  buildings  paltrily 
bedizened. 

The  development  of  the  Lake  Front  in  front  of 
the  city's  very  center  has  been  a  proud  achieve- 
ment :  and  the  plans  of  the  city  are  for  further  and 

43 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

even  superb  development  along  a  far  greater  stretch 
of  water-front.  And  if  one  should  deem  any  of  the 
plans  impossible — well,  Irving  Bacheller,  in  one  of 
his  novels,  pictures  a  visitor  to  early  Chicago  listen- 
ing to  the  extravagant  prophecies  of  a  Chicagoan; 
absolute  impossibilities! — but  the  odd  thing,  con- 
tinues the  novelist,  was  that  within  a  few  years  all 
the  prophecies  had  come  true! 

Without  control  of  the  important  mile  of  frontage 
the  city  could  not  even  have  begun  its  principal 
shore  improvement;  and  there  were  powerful  in- 
terests ranged  against  the  city;  and  the  able  work, 
against  those  interests,  of  a  Chicago  lawyer  named 
Melville  Fuller,  had  much  to  do  with  giving  him 
the  acclaim  and  prominence  that  led  to  his  being 
made  Chief  Justice  of  the  Supreme  Court  of  the 
United  States.  And  the  Lake  Front  has  become 
to  Chicago,  in  its  ultimate  importance  and  its  vital 
representation  of  the  city,  much  like  Boston  Com- 
mon to  Boston. 

Fuller  had  also,  as  a  Chicago  lawyer,  been  con- 
nected importantly  with  another  case  of  interest  to 
the  people  of  Chicago  and  also  connected  with 
Michigan  Avenue ;  for  Fuller  was  the  leading  lawyer 
for  the  much-loved  and  much-honored  Episcopalian 
rector,  Cheney,  in  his  trial  for  heresy;  Cheney  after- 
wards becoming  Bishop  Cheney  of  the  church  or- 
ganization named,  with  breezy  superiority,  the  "Re- 
formed" Episcopal  Church.  And  Bishop  Cheney 
has  but  recently  died.  He  almost  rounded  three- 
score years  of  ecclesiastical  service  in  Chicago.  He 

44 


la  ii  IB 

11  31  32  II 


THE  LAKESIDE  GLORY  OF  CHICAGO 


LIBRARY 

OF  THE 

UNIVERSITY  OF  ILLINOIS 


THE  LAKE  FRONT 

became  rector  of  Christ  Church  at  Michigan  Avenue 
and  Twenty-fourth  Street — but  it  was  in  1860,  and 
Michigan  Avenue  was  then  not  even  a  street,  but 
merely  a  rough  lane,  and  the  vicinity  was  deemed 
quite  outside  of  Chicago,  in  a  cluster  of  houses  of 
railwaymen,  called  * '  Carville, ' '  with  a  great  unbuilt- 
upon  region  between  it  and  what  was  then  Chicago 
proper.  Ordained,  and  ready  for  his  first  church, 
Cheney  had  come  to  Chicago  to  visit  his  fiancee 
and  he  found  a  church  in  " Carville."  And,  as  he 
loved  to  tell,  Christ  Church  needed  a  rector  and  he 
needed  a  parish,  so  he  was  glad  to  take  the  charge, 
at  a  salary  of  $750 — with  the  express  understanding 
that  the  church  must  be  made  to  prosper  sufficiently, 
under  his  rectorate  and  Divine  Providence,  to 
justify  such  a  great  sum.  There  were  but  seven 
members  when  he  preached  his  first  sermon !  Year 
by  year,  Christ  Church  and  its  rector  grew  old  to- 
gether, and  the  growth  of  Chicago  swept  over  the 
locality  and  far  beyond,  and  the  church  stood  by  him 
in  his  trial  and  followed  him  into  the  "Reformed," 
and  when  he  was  made  bishop  it  was  stipulated  that 
he  was  to  remain  its  rector. 

Cheney  liked  to  remember,  too,  that  the  Mexican 
War  had  made  a  deep  impression  upon  "Carville," 
for  what  was  years  afterwards  to  become  Twenty- 
second  Street  was  Ringgold  (a  little  later  a  name  of 
the  Civil  War  also),  and  the  future  Twenty- third 
Street  was  Palo  Alto,  and  the  Twenty-sixth  Street 
of  to-day  was  Buena  Vista. 

The  streets  leading  from  Michigan  Avenue,  in  the 

45 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

Mile  section,  are  themselves  notable  for  the  care- 
fully arranged  vistas  in  connection  with  them  and 
the  Lake  Front.  And  always,  with  these  vistas, 
the  blue  waters  of  the  lake  make  the  final  back- 
ground. Looking  down  Randolph  Street  one  sees 
the  peristyle,  and  completing  the  view  through 
Monroe  Street  is  a  sweeping  bow  of  roadway  and 
on  either  side  a  large  square-sided  shaft  of  stone; 
opposite  Adams  Street  (one  notices  that  the  names 
here  are  of  early  American  biography)  is  the  beauti- 
ful central  front  of  the  Art  Institute,  and  looking 
down  the  vista  of  Madison  Street  there  is  a  fountain 
with  admirable  stone  pillars,  topped  with  round- 
balled  stone. 

Making  an  impressive  ending  for  the  vista  of  East 
Ninth  Street  is  a  statue  of  General  Logan,  on  horse- 
back, high-mounded,  greatly  pedestaled,  caught  in 
bronze  in  "heroic  attitude,  the  sculptor  having  at- 
tempted the  difficult  task  of  perpetuating  a  triumph- 
ant moment. 

St.  Gaudens  made  this  Logan.  And  it  was  un- 
veiled on  a  day  of  glorious  sun  and  high  wind,  with 
booming  cannon  and  much  processioning  of  soldiers, 
most  prominent  being  those  who  had  been  General 
Logan's  own.  In  the  grand-stand,  in  apparent 
amicability,  sat  the  widow,  Mrs.  Logan,  and  by  her 
side  the  sculptor,  St.  Gaudens:  and  few  knew  that 
Mrs.  Logan  had  wished  her  husband  put  in  bronze 
as  a  statesman  instead  of  as  a  general,  and  that 
she  had  argued  the  matter  in  vain  with  St.  Gaudens, 
and  had  then  sought  to  have  him  supplanted,  by  the 

46 


THE  LAKE  FEONT 

committee,  by  another  sculptor.  All  of  which 
amused  St.  Gaudens,  years  afterwards,  when  he 
wrote  of  how  Mrs.  Logan  and  he  sat  together  in 
seeming  friendliness. 

It  seems  odd  to  think  of  setting  up  " Black  Jack" 
of  Illinois  and  Chicago  as  statesman  rather  than 
soldier:  and  yet,  after  all,  as  a  Congressman  and 
Senator  he  showed  much  ability ;  as  in  his  measured 
reply  when,  the  impeachment  of  President  Johnson 
being  proposed,  fear  was  expressed  that  it  would 
lead  to  a  revolution ;  whereupon  he  said,  with  char- 
acteristic Chicagoan  crushingness :  "A  country 
which  in  time  of  war  and  excitement  can  stand  an 
assassination  of  so  good  and  great  a  President  as 
Abraham  Lincoln,  will  stand  the  impeachment  of  as 
bad  a  President  as  Andrew  Johnson." 

Blaine  remarked  of  Logan  that,  although  there 
had  been  more  able  American  generals,  and  more 
able  American  statesman,  he  did  not  know  of  any 
one  else  who  had  so  successfully  combined  the  two 
careers. 

Superb  though  -the  Lake  Front  is,  it  was  amazing 
to  find  at  its  northern  end,  at  the  little  railway 
station  for  suburbanites,  an  eating  room  such  as 
one  would  expect  to  find  only  in  some  little  town  of 
the  Western  plains :  an  astonishingly  narrow,  funny 
place  of  frame;  temporary,  of  course — but  the 
temporary  has  lasted  for  years.  Necessarily  the 
place  will  some  day  go:  perhaps  it  has  gone  even 
as  I  write;  but  not  to  be  forgotten  are  the  eight 
high-revolving  chairs,  each  screwed  to  the  floor,  the 

47 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

rail  for  the  feet,  the  triangle  of  pie  under  its  glass 
dome,  the  doughnuts  and  sandwiches  under  their 
glass  domes,  the  coffee  machines — all  perhaps  excel- 
lent enough  but  amusingly  like  something  very  far 
away  and  long  ago. 

On  this  splendid  Lake  Front  there  comes  to  mind 
a  comparison  with  Boston ;  somehow,  the  two  cities 
seem  naturally  to  offer  themselves  for  comparison! 
each  is  a  city  whose  people  have  the  highest  esteem 
for  their  own — Boston,  the  city  that  looks  so  cheer- 
fully backward  to  grandparents,  and  Chicago,  the 
city  that  looks  so  cheerfully  forward  to  grand- 
children; Boston,  the  city  whose  cherished  outlook 
is  the  Back  Bay,  and  Chicago,  the  city  whose 
cherished  outlook  is  the  Lake  Front. 


'48 


CHAPTER  V 


OVER  RUSH   STREET   BRIDGE 


HE  year  1894  saw 
the  appearance  of 
"Trilby,"  in  which  Du 
Maurier,  both  artist  and 
novelist  that  he  was, 
presented  a  widespread 
British  belief  in  regard  to 
Chicago.  For  Du  Maurier, 
writing  of  the  rich  Miss 
Lavinia  Hunks  of  Chicago 
(and  the  use  of  the  name 
"Hunks"  was  in  itself 
deemed  a  marvelous  bit  of 
humor),  described  her  as  "so  lamentably,  so 
pathetically  plain  that  it  would  be  brutal  to  attempt 
the  cheap  and  easy  task  of  describing  her.  He  calls 
her  "a  grotesque  little  bogey  in  blue,"  completing 
his  description  with  a  picture  that  makes  her  the 
extreme  of  unattractive  ugliness. 

He  knew  nothing  of  Chicago,  but  unfamiliarity 
with  a  subject  has  never  been  a  bar  to  our  friends 
across  the  water.  In  fact,  Du  Maurier  himself 
pictures  his  laird  as  making  a  pronounced  success 
with  pictures  of  Spain — until  he  actually  went  there. 

49 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

Poetic  justice,  literary  and  artistic  justice,  came 
quickly  in  regard  to  Chicago.  For  "Trilby,"  with 
its  description  of  what  English  readers  might  sup- 
pose to  be  typical  of  Chicago  womanhood,  was  not 
much  more  than  upon  the  bookshelves  when,  in  1895, 
an  Englishman  of  note  married  a  Chicago  girl ;  and 
the  English  learned  what  '  *  Miss  Hunks ' '  was  really 
like.  Her  name  was  Leiter,  Mary  Victoria  Leiter, 
and  she  was  wealthy,  and  she  was  fine  looking,  and  of 
grace  and  charm  and  beauty,  with  a  distinguished 
air  to  which  the  British  themselves  did  honor.  And 
as  the  wife  of  a  peer,  who  became  Viceroy  of  India, 
the  highest  women  of  the  British  aristocracy  waited 
eagerly  and  often  humbly  for  a  word  or  nod  from 
her. 

And  what  a  marvelous  transformation  it  was! 
Here  in  Chicago  Mary  Leiter  lived,  in  a  house  over 
Bush  Street  Bridge.  And  as  if  by  the  touch  of  an 
enchanter,  she  is  placed  in  state  as  a  vicereine,  pre- 
siding over  the  court  of  India,  with  her  life  a  con- 
tinuous pageant,  with  guards  gorgeous  in  purple 
and  gold,  with  elephants,  with  the  most  brilliant 
Oriental  splendor;  and  all  her  honors  borne  with 
unostentatious  grace  and  dignity.  The  magic  tales 
of  India  tell  of  no  more  brilliant  transformation. 

That  was  "Miss  Hunks"  of  reality.  Nor  was 
Mary  Leiter,  wife  of  Viceroy  Curzon,  the  first 
American  woman  to  become  a  vicereine,  for  Mary 
Caton,  granddaughter  of  the  highly  picturesque 
Charles  Carroll  of  Carrollton,  had  long  before  mar- 
ried the  brother  of  the  Duke  of  Wellington,  the 

50 


OVER  RUSH  STREET  BRIDGE 

Marquis  of  Wellesley,  who  had  been  ruler  of  India 
and  was  then  viceroy,  or  technically  lord-lieutenant, 
of  Ireland.  Mary  Caton;  or  to  be  precise,  Mrs. 
Patterson,  for  she  was  a  widow;  was  not  a 
Chicagoan.  But  quite  a  number  of  Chicago  young 
women  have  become  the  wives  of  Europeans,  and  a 
notable  fact  is  that  their  husbands,  on  the  average, 
much  more  than  foreign  husbands  of  wives  from 
other  American  cities,  have  become  men  of  active 
achievement;  showing  apparently  the  vigorous 
value  of  the  Chicago  spirit.  One  may  name,  as  an 
example,  Admiral  Beatty,  so  successfully  prominent 
in  the  great  war,  who  had  married  a  wife  from 
Chicago. 

A  large,  square-fronted,  square-topped  house, 
four  stories  in  height,  with  great  large  square 
windows,  at  the  corner  of  Ontario  and  Rush  Streets, 
is  the  house  from  which  Mary  Leiter  went  forth. 
The  lower  story  is  classic  in  design,  with  fluted 
Doric  columns  at  the  windows  and  a  great  stone 
balustraded  balcony.  Smooth  gray  stone  for  the 
lower  floor,  and  for  the  upper  three  a  reddish-tawny 
brick,  makes  a  somewhat  odd  effect.  There  are  but 
two  windows  to  each  floor,  on  the  front  of  the  house, 
and  each  of  these  great  windows  has  but  a  single 
great  pane  of  glass,  with  no  dividing  crosspiece. 

Near  by  is  the  great  Cyrus  H.  McCormick  home, 
a  huge  mausoleum — like  a  pile  of  brown  stone.  For 
this  region,  in  the  latter  part  of  the  eighteen  hun- 
dreds, was  one  of  great  wealth.  It  is  a  small  neigh- 
borhood of  large  houses.  But  the  importance  of 

51 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

the  vicinity  has  mostly  gone.  Eooming  houses  and 
little  shops  have  come  near  by,  and  the  big  houses 
themselves  have  an  air  of  shabbiness,  and  the 
gardens,  with  their  high  brick  walls,  share  ther  dis- 
couraged air,  in  a  sort  of  sooty  sadness. 

McCormick  had  his  portrait  painted  by  Cabanel; 
afterwards,  made  a  member  of  the  Legion  of  Honor, 
and  receiving  in  due  course  the  red  ribbon  of  the 
Legion,  McCormick  wanted  it  painted  on  his  por- 
trait, and  so  the  picture  was  packed  up  and  sent  to 
France  to  have  the  touch  of  red  added  by  Cabanel 
himself. 

In  this  immediate  vicinity,  at  Huron  and  Cass 
Streets,  is  a  large  church  of  gray  sandstone,  with 
high-pitched  roof  of  dark  slate;  it  is  the  Church 
of  St.  James,  and  was  long  deemed  and  seems  to  be 
still  deemed  the  leading  Episcopalian  church  of  the 
city,  for  those  who  wish  the  mingled  odor  of  society 
and  sanctity.  The  houses  close  by  are  not  quite 
of  Leiter  or  McCormick  costliness,  although  large 
and  comfortable,  with  grass  plots;  and  it  is  not 
surprising  to  learn  that  most  of  the  congregation 
nowadays  come  from  a  distance.  The  home*  of 
Laura,  in  that  famous  Chicago  novel,  "The  Pit," 
was  cornerwise  opposite ;  a  house  built  as  the  church 
rectory,  and  recently  torn  down;  and  she  and  Jad- 
win  were  married  at  St.  James's. 

In  spite  of  social  standing,  the  church  has  but 
ordinary  architectural  standing;  and  one  fancies 
that  the  square  tower,  with  one  toothpick  standing 
higher  than  the  other  three,  is  a  trifle  better  than  the 

52 


OVER  BUSH  STREET  BRIDGE 

rest  of  the  church ;  and  you  learn  that  this  may  pos- 
sibly be  owing  to  this  part  being  older,  having  stood 
through  the  Great  Fire,  when  all  the  rest  of  the 
structure  was  destroyed. 

For  the  Great  Fire,  having  leaped  across  the 
river,  swept  this  entire  region,  and  went  devastat- 
ingly  on  to  the  northward.  Not  a  house  is  now 
standing  in  this  part  of  the  city,  that  stood  before 
the  fire.  It  is  generally  said  that  the  Mahlon  Ogden 
home,  which  has  since  been  torn  down,  was  the  only 
house  that  escaped,  and  that  it  was  left  standing 
alone  in  the  midst  of  smoky  desolation.  But  the 
home  of  a  policeman  also  escaped.  And  it  seems 
.as  if  the  story  of  a  dry  cistern  and  the  saving  of  a 
house  by  deluging  its  roof  with  cider  deserves  to  be 
kept  in  mind. 

After  the  Great  Fire,  Chicago  must  have 
presented  what  seemed  a  series  of  Gothic  ruins ;  for 
photographs  of  the  time  show  church  after  church 
destroyed,  except  for  lonely  looking  walls,  solitary 
crocketed-like-  fragments,  hollow-eyed  ruins,  all 
seeming  grim  and  very  ancient. 

What  is  practically  the  Fire  Monument  of 
Chicago  is  the  old  water  tower,  standing  in  the 
Lincoln  Parkway.  Although  this  is  the  only 
structure  still  standing  past  which  the  fire  swept  in 
this  northern  section,  there  has  been  persistent  ef- 
fort to  have  it  destroyed,  in  the  alleged  interests 
of  improvement;  and  determined  have  been  the  ef- 
forts to  retain  it  in  place,  as  an  honored  memento 
of  a  terrible  event ;  for  in  the  days  after  the  fire  it 

53 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

served  as  a  helpful  landmark  for  wandering  multi- 
tudes searching1  for  the  spots  where  stood  their 
homes.  Nor  is  it  without  a  certain  impressiveness. 
A  tall  shaft  rises  from  a  cluttered  and  clustered 
base,  having  twelve  towers  at  varying  heights.  It 
is  all  white  stone,  and,  pseudo-Gothic  though  it  is, 
is  effective  in  its  own  odd  way  and  looks  much 
more  like  a  Gothic  monument  than  a  water  tower. 

A  curious  cluster  of  Moorish-looking  buildings  at 
Cass  and  Ohio  Streets,  with  onion-domes,  crescent- 
topped,  dominates  that  vicinity,  and  one  finds  it  to 
be  Medinah  Temple,  of  the  Masons. 

In  this  same  immediate  region  stands  a  large  and 
fortress-like  building,  heavy  and  solid  and  unin- 
teresting in  appearance,  but  with  a  great  deal  of 
interest  in  reality.  For  this  is  the  building  about 
which  much  of  the  life  and  interest  of  the  city  re- 
volves; the  building  of  the  Historical  Society. 

Surely  no  other  city,  to  welcome  a  distinguished 
general  as  the  new  commander  of  the  military  de- 
partment, would  give  him  a  reception  at  its  histori- 
cal society  rooms  and  have  the  best  people  of  the 
city  present ;  but  Chicago  does  things  in  its  own  way, 
and  that  is  precisely  what  it  did  for  General  Wood. 

The  activities  of  the  Historical  Society  are  sur- 
prising in  scope.  Take  any  report  of  a  year's  do- 
ings ;  and  it  will  show  what  such  a  society  can  do 
and  be.  For  example,  in  November  the  annual 
meeting,  with  distinguished  folk  a-plenty.  On  a 
December  afternoon,  three  hundred  teachers  came, 
on  invitation,  to  listen  to  an  illustrated  lecture  on 

54 


OVER  EUSH  STREET  BRIDGE 

Chicago  history.  Isn  't  that  fine !  Early  in  Feb- 
ruary, a  reception  and  tea  with  five  hundred  guests, 
the  names  of  the  committee  who  worked  to  make  it 
a  success  including  the  people  of  the  city  most 
prominent  socially  and  in  wealth.  There  was  old- 
fashioned  silver  on  the  tea-table,  the  orchestra 
played  airs  of  three-quarters  of  a  century  ago,  and 
there  was  a  costume  exhibit,  notable  from  the  fine 
gowns  that  were  shown,  inherited  from  mothers  or 
grandmothers.  And  as  a  special  point  there  was 
present,  attired  in  the  gown  she  had  worn  at  her 
wedding,  the  daughter  of  the  first  president  of  the 
Historical  Society. 

Another  time  they  had  a  reception  with  such  at- 
tention to  interesting  detail  as  the  reproduction,  on 
the  invitations  to  the  reception,  of  a  picture  show- 
ing a  reception  at  the  White  House  in  1865:  this 
having  a  local  touch  because  Miss  Arnold,  one  of 
those  in  the  receiving  line,  remembers  being  at  a 
White  House  reception  in  1865  with  her  father,  an 
Illinois  Congressman  and  a  biographer  of  Lincoln. 

Another  time,  and  there  is  the  exhibition  of  a 
collection  of  pieced  quilts  and  hand-woven  cover- 
lets and  old-time  home-made  agricultural  imple- 
ments, many  of  them  gathered  and  presented  by 
Emerson  Hough,  the  Chicago  novelist. 

The  constant  interest  in  the  past,  in  a  city  so 
markedly  a  city  of  the  present,  is  highly  interesting. 
When  the  Society  makes  an  acquisition  the  news- 
papers treat  the  matter  as  news  of  general  interest, 
to  be  prominently  featured.  And  it  is  astonishing 

55 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

what  a  quantity  of  interesting  material  has  been 
gathered.  There  is  a  little  old  brass-nail-studded 
cylindrical  hair-trunk,  still  containing  the  wedding 
dress  of  Mrs.  Rebecca  Heald,  the  wife  of  Captain 
Heald.  It  was  carried  on  horseback  on  their  wed- 
ding trip,  in  1811,  to  Fort  Dearborn,  when  he  took 
command  of  the  post.  One  pictures  the  young  bride 
and  this  sweet  wedding  dress  in  the-  wilderness  of 
that  time;  and  the  couple  were  happy  for  the  brief 
period  before  the  outbreak  of  the  war  with  Eng- 
land. Then  came  the  attack  and  massacre ;  she  was 
captured;  and  this  trunk  was  carried  to  St.  Louis 
by  one  of  the  Indians.  There  it  was  recognized  and 
ransomed  by  a  friend  of  Heald 's,  who  sorrowfully 
sent  it  to  the  young  wife's  parents,  fully  believing 
that  she  must  be  dead.  But  to  the  amazement  of 
all  she  was  alive,  a  prisoner,  and  after  a  while  she 
was  set  free.  And  this  trunk  and  its  contents,  with 
its  strange  eventful  history,  is  here.  Sir  Walter 
Scott,  had  he  been  a  Chicagoan,  would  have  written 
a  novel  around  such  a  relic,  with  such  a  series  of 
happenings !  And  it  would  have  been  one  of  his 
best. 

And  here  is  a  miniature  of  Captain  Wells,  who 
bravely  gave  his  life  on  the  eventful  day  of 
massacre.  And  how  it  brings  him  actually  before 
us! — with  his  high  red  collar  up  to  his  very  ears, 
and  his  blue  coat  and  white  epaulets  and  brass 
buttons  and  the  black  stock  under  his  chin.  A  blue- 
eyed,  long-nosed,  pleasant-faced  young  man — and 

56 


OVER  EUSH  STREET  BRIDGE 

somehow  that  distant  day  of  death  seems  very,  very 
real  and  very  close. 

There  is  a  wide  variety  of  the  unexpected  here. 
And  notable  is  the  very  last  letter  that  was  written 
by  John  Brown.  It  is  to  his  sister  Mary,  and  is 
dated  at  Charlestown,  November  22,  1857.  He 
knows  that  certain  death  is  at  hand,  but  he  writes 
calmly,  in  kindly  comforting  fashion.  He  had 
grieved,  he  said,  from  fear  that  they  would  feel 
ashamed  because  of  his  death  on  the  scaffold,  but 
her  letter  had  reassured  him,  and  * '  Now  I  have  done. 
May  the  God  of  peace  bring  us  all  again  from  the 
dead."  And  he  is  "Your  affectionate  brother,  John 
Brown." 

And  here  is  the  richly  embroidered  coat  worn  by 
Colonel  Baum,  who  led  the  Hessians  and  British 
at  the  Battle  of  Bennington,  in  the  Revolutionary 
War.  Baum  was  mortally  wounded,  and  his  blood- 
stained coat  was  handed  to  a  young  American 
soldier  named  Wood;  and  it  remained  in  family 
possession  for  generations,  and  was  brought  by  a 
Wood  to  Chicago,  and  at  length  found  its  place  here. 

The  building  is  crowded  with  mementoes  and  por- 
traits, with  letters  and  documents,  but,  far  more 
important  than  these  things,  is  the  spirit  in  which 
the  Historical  Society  is  regarded.  It  stands  not 
merely  for  the  past,  but  for  what  is  interesting  or 
important  in  the  past,  and  it  aids  materially  in  up- 
holding civic  pride.  And  it  has  become  quite  a 
habit,  in  all  seriousness  and  not  from  humor,  when 

57 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

any  one  asks  a  question  which  cannot  at  once  be 
answered,  to  refer  him  to  the  Historical  Society; 
and  this,  even  with  questions  entirely  unconnected 
with  anything  connected  with  history. 

This  district  gives  the  impression  of  being  a  sec- 
tion set  apart,  a  district  by  itself,  a  community 
gathered  here  just  over  Rush  Street  Bridge;  or  at 
least,  where  Eush  Street  Bridge  stood  for  so  many 
years. 

The  lake  is  not  far  away,  and  projecting  into  the 
lake  is  one  of  the  things  of  which  Chicago  is  most 
proud,  an  immense  municipal  pier.  It  is  near  the 
mouth  of  the  river.  It  is  at  the  end  of  Grand  Ave- 
nue. Chicago  declares  it  to  be  the  greatest  of  all 
municipal  piers,  of  any  city ;  it  has  a  length  of  three 
thousand  feet  and  its  uses  are  mainly  for  public 
recreation. 

A  little  farther  along  the  shore  was  "Shanty- 
town,  ' '  ruled  over  by  the  '  *  Queen  of  the  Sands ' ' ! — 
and  one  sees,  that  in  Chicago  even  vice  is  apt  to 
have  a  picturesque  side,  at  least  in  nomenclature. 

That  the  Kush  Street  Bridge  could  exist  for  so 
many  years  after  its  inadequacy  was  painfully  evi- 
dent is  one  of  the  things  which  point  out  the  con- 
tradictoriness  of  Chicago.  And  it  not  only  long 
continued  its  inadequate  existence,  but  Chicagoans 
felt  a  pride  in  it !  At  the  northern  end  of  Michigan 
Avenue,  that  wonderful  Mile,  two  immense  streams 
of  traffic  merged  to  cross  a  rickety,  narrow,  unsightly 
bridge :  "the  bridge  with  the  greatest  traffic  of  any 
bridge  in  the  world,"  Chicagoans  declared,  stand- 

58 


THE  VISTA  OF  ADAMS  STREET 


LIBRARY 

OF  THE 

UNIVERSITY  OF  ILLINOIS 


OVER  RUSH  STREET  BRIDGE 

ing  ready  to  give  figures  regarding  vehicles  and 
pedestrians  crossing  any  bridge  in  London  or  Paris 
or  New  York  if  you  would  but  listen.  It  seemed 
only  a  busy,  overworked  little  bridge.  Yet  this  in- 
adequate bridge,  that  any  other  city  would  have 
done  away  with  over  night,  took  years  and  years  for 
Chicago  to  replace.  And  this  a  city  of  triumphantly 
big  things !  A  new  bridge,  no  matter  how  elaborate, 
across  that  narrow  stream,  could  not  for  a  moment 
be  compared  with  any  one  of  the  majestic  bridges 
across  the  East  River,  in  New  York,  or  even  with 
one  of  the  great  high-level  bridges  of  Cleveland; 
yet  these  cities  never  made  the  pother  and  bother 
over  any  one  of  them  that  Chicago  made  over  this. 

And  the  standpoint  was  always  so  amusing.  I  re- 
marked to  a  Chicago  business  man,  one  day,  in  re- 
gard to  its  obvious  shortcomings,  but  he  could  not 
see  them,  although  at  that  very  moment,  as  we 
looked,  there  was  inextricable  jamming  and  locking 
of  'buses  and  motors  and  vans,  and  the  little  old 
bridge  was  shaking  like  a  ship  in  a  storm.  "It's 
a  good  bridge,"  he  said,  puzzled;  "a  perfectly  good 
bridge.  Why,  that  bridge  carries  more  traffic — " 
and  so  on. 

But  at  length  the  so-long-needed  improvement  was 
got  under  way,  and  in  1920  it  was  completed,  and 
now  a  really  fine  and  adequate  bridge,  a  two-story 
bridge,  connects  Michigan  Avenue  with  the  splendid 
region  to  the  northward,  and  the  advance  of  business 
blocks  and  apartment  houses  on  the  farther  side  of 
the  river  has  received  important  impetus. 

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THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

The  abutments  of  Bush  Street  Bridge,  on  the 
south  bank  of  the  river,  marked  the  center  of  the 
stockade  of  the  long-vanished  Fort  Dearborn.  And 
Chicago  itself  was  for  quite  a  while  known  by  the 
name  of  Fort  Dearborn. 

Every  trace  of  the  fort  has  gone.  Indeed,  it  is 
a  very  literal  fact  that  so  far  as  the  city's  early 
history  is  concerned  the  sites  alone  are  the  sights. 
There  are  no  buildings  associated  with  the  men  and 
the  stirring  events  of  even  a  century  ago.  There 
is  no  bit  of  stockade,  no  doddering  house  front,  no 
building  incrusted  with  the  literal  or  figurative 
patina  of  time. 

The  spot  where  the  beginning  of  the  continuous 
settlement  of  Chicago  was  made  was  where,  long 
afterwards,  the  Kush  Street  Bridge  touched  the 
north  bank  of  the  river.  The  man  who  began  the 
continuous  settlement  came  here  during  the  Revolu- 
tionary War ;  a  black  man  from  San  Domingo,  bear- 
ing the  ornate  name  of  Jean  Baptiste  Point  de 
Saible.  He  sold  his  log  house  to  a  trapper  French- 
man, and  the  Frenchman  sold  it  to  John  Kinzie, 
the  first  American,  the  first  real  settler.  It  was  in 
1804  that  Kinzie  and  his  family  settled  here,  and 
from  time  to  time  he  so  altered  and  enlarged  the 
house  that  its  original  aspect  quite  disappeared. 

Kinzie  was  one  of  the  early  American  silver- 
smiths. But  there  were  few  on  Lake  Michigan  then 
to  buy  silverware:  the  fort  was  built  in  the  same 
year  that  Kinzie  came,  and  a  few  settlers  drifted 
gradually  in:  and  Kinzie,  leaving  his  art  largely  in 

60 


OVER  BUSH  STREET  BRIDGE 

abeyance,  became  important  as  an  Indian  trader, 
receiving  the  boat  sent  annually  by  Astor's  fur 
company  and  acquiring  acquaintance  and  influence 
among  the  Indians.  But  he  worked  somewhat  in 
silver,  and  a  few  old  Chicago  families  treasure  ex- 
amples of  his  skill. 

Fort  Dearborn  was  named  after  a  man  who  never 
came  here,  never  went  west  of  Niagara ;  but  Chicago 
has  the  right  to  feel  proud  that  the  man  whose  name 
was  given  to  the  fort  was  full  of  a  vital  energy  that 
was  quite  Chicago-like.  He  was  no  office-chair 
patriot.  When  he  heard  of  Lexington  he  gathered 
a  company  of  sixty  and  led  them  to  the  army,  march- 
ing sixty-five  miles  a  day.  He  fought  at  Bunker 
Hill.  He  was  not  only  present  at  the  surrender  of 
Burgoyne  but  at  that  of  Cornwallis.  He  was  for 
eight  years  secretary  of  War  under  Jefferson.  And 
it  need  not  be  matter  of  surprise  that  Dearborn 
was  an  officer  in  the  War  of  1812  as  well  as  in  the 
Revolution,  for,  after  all,  we  were  fighting  the  same 
King  in  both  wars.  And  it  was  only  a  little  while 
after  the  tragic  episode  of  Fort  Dearborn,  that 
Wordsworth  wrote  sadly  of  the  King  whom  we 
were  for  the  second  time  fighting,  as  "  deprived  of 
sight  and  lamentably  wrapped  in  two-fold  night." 

Tragedy  came  to  Fort  Dearborn  through  an  order 
from  General  Hull  directing  Captain  Heald  to  evac- 
uate the  fort.  This  was  the  same  Hull  who  in 
cowardly  fashion  surrendered  Detroit.  He  was 
offered  the  opportunity  to  give  up  both  Chicago  and 
Detroit  and  actually  seized  the  opportunity! 

61 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

It  was  in  the  first  year  of  the  War  of  1812.  The 
Indians  had  been  promptly  let  loose  against  us 
along  the  border.  To  retreat  from  Fort  Dearborn, 
for  scores  of  miles,  through  the  Indian  country,  with 
women  and  children  and  baggage  (some  of  the  gar- 
rison had  their  families  with  them,  and  a  few  scat- 
tered settlers,  with  their  families,  had  sought 
shelter  at  the  fort),  was  an  impossibility. 

It  was  not  a  great  military  happening,  compared 
with  the  European  events  of  the  period.  It  was  but 
an  unfortunate  tragedy  that  came  from  the  employ- 
ment of  Indian  allies.  It  was  tucked  in,  as  to  date, 
between  Wellington 's  great  battles  in  Spain  and  the 
overwhelming  Battle  of  Leipzig,  when  France  was 
England's  bitterest  enemy  and  Germany  and 
Austria  were  England's  allies.  How  disconcert- 
ingly topsy-turvy  is  history!  For  in  the  War  of 
1812  we  fought  against  England,  and  immensely 
helped  France.  But  only  a  few  years  before,  Wash- 
ington was  drawn  from  what  he  had  deemed  final 
retirement  to  head  the  army  for  expected  war  with 
France. 

The  Chicago  Massacre  seems  very  near.  Here  by 
this  black  and  sluggish  stream — now  black  and 
always  sluggish — the  little  party  of  nearly  one  hun- 
dred went  forth  to  what  they  knew  was  almost 
certain  death.  Captain  Wells,  whose  gay  minia- 
ture we  have  just  seen  over  yonder,  blackened  his 
face  in  Indian  fashion,  to  show  the  grim  despair 
of  the  situation.  Near  at  hand,  where  now  stands 
a  great  department  store,  the  Indians  had  left  their 

62 


OVER  RUSH  STREET  BRIDGE 

camp  and  had  gone  to  the  lakeside  trail  to  wait. 

In  some  contemporary  account  I  have  read  of 
this  as  a  "massacree,"  and  I  like  the  word;  it 
sounds  so  much  more  terrible  with  the  double  "e." 
And  it  was  the  terror  of  this  "massacree"  which  ac- 
counted in  considerable  degree  for  the  energy  with 
which  Illinois  took  part  in  the  Black  Hawk  War; 
poor  old  Black  Hawk  being  rather  puzzled  by  the 
ireful  commotion  rather  unintentionally  aroused. 

Following  the  Black  Hawk  War  the  Indians  were 
removed  from  what  they,  and  their  forefathers  for 
centuries,  loved  as  the  Illinois  country,  and  sent  to 
the  other  side  of  the  Mississippi.  The  United 
States  was  not  ungenerous,  so  it  would  seem,  for  it 
freely  handed  out,  at  the  last  moment,  sums  of 
money  to  such  Indians  as  claimed  rights  in  land. 
And  then  came  more  than  doubts  as  to  the  gener- 
osity of  the  government,  or  at  least  of  its  agents: 
for  the  money  was  handed  out,  to  the  total  of  many 
thousands  of  dollars,  all  in  fifty-cent  pieces,  and 
white  men,  with  great  supplies  of  poor  whiskey,  stood 
by  to  tempt  the  red  men  to  buy,  and  of  course  civil- 
ization beat  savagery  and  took  away  almost  all  its 
silver  wealth;  it  was  only  because  adverse  winds 
so  delayed  a  ship,  loaded  with  whiskey,  that  it  could 
not  reach  here  in  time,  that  the  Indians  got  away 
with  any  money  at  all.  The  visible  supply  of  drink 
having  vanished,  the  Indians,  streaked  and  daubed 
with  paint,  drunkenly  danced  and  yelled  around 
what  was  to  be  the  northern  end  of  Rush  Street 
Bridge  and  then,  dancing  and  whooping,  yelling, 

63 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

gesticulating,  brandishing  weapons,  they  circled 
about  the  future  city's  earliest  localities,  crossing 
the  river  at  the  southward  and  returning  toward 
the  lake  along  what  was  in  time  to  be  South  Water 
Street,  now  a  street  jammed  and  crowded  and 
thronged  with  wagons  and  with  sellers  and  buyers 
of  vegetables,  poultry,  eggs  and  butter;  a  survival, 
this  street  market,  with  its  bordering  commission 
houses,  of  a  Chicago  almost  as  old  as  the  time  of 
the  Indians,  and  now  marked,  itself,  for  passing 
away  in  the  interests  of  modern  change. 

With  that  wild  orgy  and  wild  march  the  Indians 
vanished  from  Chicago.  Old  settlers  used  to  tell 
that,  as  they  passed  the  Sauganash  Hotel,  where 
later  the  Wigwam  was  to  stand,  where  Lincoln  was 
to  be  nominated,  a  few  visitors  looked  out,  fright- 
ened, the  Indians  there  having  an  access  of  wild 
fury. 

The  Chicago  Eiver  is  a  dark  and  dismal  and 
somber  stream,  over  which  gulls  sweep  and  dip  and 
dive  and  utter  their  hoarse  short  cries,  just  as  I 
have  seen  them  dip  and  dive  and  heard  them  cry 
over  some  of  the  most  beautiful  river  mouths  in 
England;  and  gulls  must  have  dived  and  cried  here 
when  the  first  explorers  came,  when  Chicago  was  all 
wilderness ;  and  so  these  gulls  are  probably  descend- 
ants of  those  that  welcomed  Joliet  and  Marquette 
and  La  Salle,  and  of  those  that  later  soared  and 
swooped  and  cried  on  the  day  of  the  "massacree." 
The  gulls  of  Chicago  are  of  ancient  pedigree. 

The  Chicago  poets  are,  naturally,  attracted  by 

64 


OVER  RUSH  STREET  BRIDGE 

the  waterside  of  the  city,  and  one  of  them,  Edholm, 
writes  of  the  river: 

"They  have  bound  me  with  bridges, 

With  tunnels  burrowed  under  me ! 

Incessant,  unresting, 

All  day  and  all  night, 

Traffic  roars  over  me, 

And  my  uplook  to  the  blessed  sky 

Is  barred  with  girders,  cables,  stacks. ' ' 

And  to  another  Chicago  poet,  Sandburg,  it  is 
a  boat  seeking  the  mouth  of  the  river,  in  a  fog,  that 
appeals,  and  its  sad-sounding  whistle 

"Calls  and  cries  unendingly, 
Like  some  lost  child 
In  tears  and  trouble 
Hunting  the  harbor's  breast, 
And  the  harbor's  eyes." 

Where  the  Kinzie  house  once  stood,  across  the 
river  from  Fort  Dearborn,  a  soap  factory  long  ago 
arose ;  and  very  recently  the  factory  was  torn  down, 
in  making  room  for  the  new  bridge  and  its  ap- 
proaches. Prominent  on  the  side  of  the  building, 
where  countless  Chicagoans  have  seen  and  read  it, 
in  the  course  of  the  years  that  it  was  there,  was  a 
huge  sign  reminiscent  of  the  once  familiar  and 
homely  custom  of  the  week-end  tub !  I  happened  to 
be  passing,  one  day  in  1919,  when  the  last  of  the 
old  sign  was  actually  disappearing;  and  it  showed, 
not  literally  the  Saturday  night  bath  as  a  custom, 
but  as  of  Sunday  morning;  perhaps  with  the  idea 

65 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

of  its  interfering  less  with  a  business  day;  at  any 
rate,  the  sign,  large  and  plain,  read:  " Wonderful 
Sunday  morning  bath  soap." 


66 


CHAPTER  VI 


THE   LOOP   HOUNDS 

CITY  that  can  designate 
a  large  part  of  its  people 
as  "Loop  Hounds," 
and  do  it  genially  and 
have  it  taken  good- 
naturedly,  almost  as  a  compli- 
ment and  assuredly  not  as  a 
criticism,  must  needs  be  an  un- 
usual city,  a  city  of  quality 
and  of  qualities.  It  is  a 
pleasant  local  phrase.  It  is 
used  by  Chicagoans  just  as 
they  use  "prairie  dogs"  to  de- 
scribe the  monumental  lions  in  front  of  the  Art  In- 
stitute. They  would  resent  "Loop  Hounds"  had 
the  phrase  not  been  made  in  Chicago. 

The  myriad  whose  occupational  activities  are 
centered  within  the  Loop  are  the  Loop  Hounds ;  and 
the  term  includes  the  big  merchants,  both  wholesale 
and  retail,  and  bankers,  and  city  and  county  officials 
and  judges  and  lawyers  and  uncounted  thousands 
of  workers  in  offices  and  stores.  Within  the  Loop 
too,  or  at  its  very  edge,  where  the  city  looks  out 
over  the  lake,  are  almost  every  club  and  every  hotel. 

67 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

Never  in  any  city  was  there  such  a  compact  segrega- 
tion of  important  interests.  The  Loop  is  a  parallel- 
ogram, formed  by  the  Elevated  lines,  and  including 
a  limited  number  of  city  blocks.  The  trains  come 
in  from  north  and  south  and  west  and  intricately 
and  noisily  box  the  compass  and  vanish.  In  com- 
mon parlance  and  understanding  the  Loop  reaches 
from  about  Twelfth  Street  to  the  river,  at  the  north, 
and  from  the  south  branch  of  the  river  to  Grant 
Park;  thus  extending  a  trifle  outside  of  the  literal 
Elevated  restrictions. 

It  has  become  the  custom  in  Chicago  to  decry  the 
Loop,  to  criticize  it,  to  try  to  do  away  with  it  be- 
cause of  congestion  of  business  and  traffic  within  its 
bounds.  And  it  is  amazing  to  notice  how  quickly 
the  influence  of  the  Loop  vanishes;  how  quickly, 
leaving  its  precincts,  one  comes  to  raggedness  of 
building,  into  the  poorly  built  or  even  almost  squalid 
regions.  And  it  seems  not  much  more  than  a 
stone's  throw  from  the  City  Hall  to  great  spaces 
used  only  as  switch  yards.  The  Loop  Hounds  are 
like  Brahma  chickens  in  so  readily  believing  them- 
selves to  be  held  within  an  imaginary  boundary  for 
their  business  affairs :  what  a  foot-high  wire  is  to  a 
Brahma,  the  Elevated  structure  is  to  the  Loop 
Hound. 

The  Loop,  whether  or  not  it  has  at  length  passed 
its  usefulness,  has  been  of  incalculable  benefit  to 
Chicago.  The  close  centering  of  every  kind  of  life, 
of  bankers  and  shoppers,  club  men  and  club  women, 
public  officials  and  merchants,  making  them  all  into 

68 


THE  LOOP  HOUNDS 

one  united  family  constantly  and  unavoidably  meet- 
ing one  another,  has  been  an  immense  influence; 
and  in  addition  there  has  been  constant  mingling, 
with  all  these,  of  all  the  many  visitors  to  the  city. 
With  its  interests  united  within  the  Loop,  Chicago  has 
grown  in  strength  and  power.  Her  business  center 
stands  within  two  blocks  of  where  it  stood  in  the 
earliest  days.  There  has  been  no  constant  deser- 
tion of  one  business  district  for  another  as  in  New 
York,  where  the  shopping  has  swept  from  City  Hall 
almost  to  Central  Park.  The  women  of  Chicago 
still  go  shopping  within  the  district  that  has  been 
the  center  from  the  days  when  pioneer  merchants 
built  the  early  shops  such  as  those  which  Joseph 
Jefferson  saw  as  a  boy.  And  this  holding  to  the  old 
locality  has  given  Chicago  much  of  constancy,  of 
stability,  has  made  it  a  city  holding  fast  to  tradi- 
tion. And  this  steady  holding  to  the  Loop  district 
— beginning  many  years  before  the  building  of  Ele- 
vated tracks  made  a  literal  Loop — is  the  more  re- 
markable when  it  is  realized  that  the  city  has  been 
extended  to  a  length  of  nearly  thirty  miles.  The 
Loop  has  given  the  city  its  homogeneity. 

There  is  dramatic  strength  in  the  aspect  of  the 
buildings  of  the  Loop,  as  seen  from  the  farther  side 
of  the  river.  The  buildings  stand  in  the  dignity  of 
massed  compactness,  the  dignity  of  strength  and 
size  and  solidity.  There  are  not  the  towering 
heights  of  New  York,  for  the  building  law  forbids ; 
and  it  has  been  suggested  that  Chicago  put  limita- 
tions on  the  height  of  her  skyscrapers  only  when  it 

69 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

was  clear  that  New  York  was  leaving  her  hopelessly 
behind  in  the  race  for  height:  but  such  a  cynical 
thought  is  not  heeded  or  needed  here  by  the  lake! 
And  Chicago  is  immensely  proud  of  the  fact  that  it 
is  the  city  which  first  began  steel  framework  con- 
struction of  tall  buildings,  the  factor  which  makes 
the  lofty  business  building  possible. 

Prominent  in  the  mass,  seen  from  across  the  river, 
is  a  huge  pillared  building  which  loses  much  of  its 
impressiveness  when  seen  close  at  hand.  It  is  the 
City  Hall  and  county  building,  a  great  structure,  oc- 
cupying the  entire  square  between  Washington, 
Clark,  La  Salle  and  Randolph  Streets.  But  it 
sorely  needs  an  open  space  about  it,  to  give  archi- 
tectural effect. 

In  fact  what  strikes  a  stranger  at  once,  is  the 
curious  absence  of  any  open  square  in  the  business 
section.  In  early  days  the  city  had  an  open  public 
square;  with  a  jail,  in  early  American  fashion, 
standing  in  one  corner  of  it;  but  it  was  decided  to 
utilize  the  conveniently  vacant  open  space  by  build- 
ing the  City  Hall  all  over  it. 

The  post-office  is  a  huge  building ;  a  mass  of  black- 
ish gray,  with  the  dull  green  of  copper;  occupying 
the  entire  block,  to  the  sidewalk  lines,  between 
Clark,  Adams  and  Dearborn  Streets  and  Jackson 
Boulevard.  A  great  dome  is  in  the  center ;  on  each 
of  the  four  fronts  is  a  great,  high-pedimented  pil- 
lared wing;  between  the  wings  the  spaces  are  filled 
with  lower  masses,  topped  with  openwork  balus- 
trades of  stone.  And  unless  very  recently  changed, 

70 


.      THE  LOOP  HOUNDS 

the  post-office,  excellent  though  it  is  as  offering  a 
sheltered  passageway  through  from  street  to  street, 
is  most  ingeniously  planned  to  cause  inconvenience 
to  those  using  the  building  as  a  place  to  do  ordinary 
postal  business. 

I  like  the  Chicago  impulse  to  put  itself  in  print  in 
regard  to  its  own  features:  and  it  is  Masters  who 
versifically  says : 

"Around  the  Loop  the  Elevated  crawls, 
And  giant  shadows  sink  against  the  walls 
"Where  ten  to  twenty  stories  strive  to  hold 
The  pale  refractions  of  the  sunset's  gold." 

Yet  not  everything  is  precisely  what  it  ought  to 
be.  I  went  one  evening,  to  where  some  five  hundred 
were  gathered  in  a  hall  on  the  top  floor  of  a  business 
block.  There  was  one  single  elevator.  There  was 
only  one  stair,  and  it  was  of  wood,  twisting  down 
alongside  the  elevator.  I  noticed  no  fire  escape  and 
no  "Exit"  signs.  And  men  smoked  freely. 

Naturally,  where  business  of  every  kind  is  so  nar- 
rowly compressed,  there  are  often  busy  street 
scenes,  and  Chicagoans  themselves  love  to  point  to 
the  intersection  of  State  and  Madison  as  the  most 
crowded  of  all  corners;  "in  the  world,"  of  course, 
and  not  merely  in  Chicago.  And  they  indicate  State 
Street  as  the  greatest  shopping  district  in  the  world. 
And  the  visitor,  whether  hesitant  or  not  as  to  the 
acceptance  of  the  claims,  at  least  sees  a  great  many 
people  on  the  streets  and  sees  exceedingly  crowded 
stores:  and  often  notices  highly  artistic  care  and 

71 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

effectiveness  in  window  displays,  evanescent  though 
they  must  necessarily  be.  And  the  waiting-rooms 
of  the  big  department  stores  are  not  filled  with 
women  suburbanites,  as  in  New  York,  but  with 
women  city  dwellers. 

Much  of  the  architecture  of  the  Loop  is  really  not- 
able; some  of  it  is  extraordinarily  fine.  In  "The 
Common  Lot,"  by  the  Chicago  novelist  Herrick,  a 
Chicago  architect,  who  has  been  studying  in  France, 
is  asked  if  he  does  not  think  a  man  ought  to  take 
back  to  his  home  what  he  has  learned;  and  he  re- 
plies, "Well,  perhaps,  if  the  place  weren't  just  Chi- 
cago." But  one  does  not  see  reason  for  this,  for 
Chicago  has  been  developing  superbly. 

There  is,  indeed,  much  that  is  odd  or  undesirable. 
There  is  a  style  which  I  find  myself  terming  dis- 
tinctly Chicagoan;  that  of  the  Masonic  Temple,  for 
example,  the  skyscraper  which  everybody  used  to 
go  to  see  as  one  of  the  wonders  of  the  world ;  and  the 
Auditorium,  a  ponderous  style,  with  great  heavy 
arches;  and  there  are  such  unusualnesses  as  the 
curves  at  the  bottom  of  the  Monadnock  building  and 
the  curve-out  at  the  top  of  the  square  Auditorium 
tower.  But  on  the  whole  the  average  is  markedly 
high,  for  beauty  and  dignity.  And  with  many  of  the 
buildings  expense  has  not  been  considered. 

I  entered,  one  day,  one  of  the  twenty-story  build- 
ings, with  no  expectation  of  coming  upon  anything 
notable.  The  entrance-way  opened  into  a  great 
square-pillared  Italian-like  enclosed  piazza,  two 
stories  high,  all  in  white  porcelain,  and  there  was  a 

72 


THE  LOOP  HOUNDS 

glorious  stair  of  white  marble,  and  this  costly  in- 
terior court  was  surrounded  by  attractive  interior 
shops,  on  two  separate  stories,  here  around  the  big 
central  court,  shops  of  hatters,  opticians,  tailors, 
manicures,  shops  for  the  sale  of  candy  or  cigars  or 
flowers,  the  upper  eighteen  stories  being  offices. 
Chicago  claims  to  spend  more  money  on  its  business 
buildings  than  does  any  other  city  of  the  world. 

These  interior  shops  suggest  a  curious  develop- 
ment of  business  here;  for  several  office  buildings 
have  been  quite  given  over  to  little  shops,  of  book- 
sellers, dressmakers,  a  long  variety  of  occupations, 
the  offices  being  made  into  little  shops  by  putting  in 
show  windows,  looking  into  the  corridors.  The 
reason,  of  course,  is  the  congestion  of  the  Loop. 
Chicago  has  become  quite  accustomed  to  shop  in 
office  buildings:  "light  shop-keeping,"  they  call  it; 
and  an  advertisement  of  the  best-known  of  these 
buildings  expresses  the  claims  for  this  kind  of  busi- 
ness. "On  a  rainy  day  when  the  sidewalks  are 
muddily  discouraging,  what  joy  to  be  able  to  find 
just  about  everything  a  woman  wants,  and  many 
things  she  had  not  realized  she  wanted,  right  here, 
down  warm,  bright  corridors — an  indoor  city  in 
itself.  We  have  shops  for  many  needs,  and  all 
purses,  with  merchandise  fresh  and  ultra-new, 
which  you  will  covet."  Another  point  is  that  such 
massing  of  shopping  is  a  further  aid  in  maintaining 
the  compactness  of  the  business  section. 

When  a  druggist  named  Schmidt  died,  in  1918, 
the  city  showed  how  closely  it  may  continue  to  keep, 

73 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

with  particularity,  local  records  of  a  nature  interest- 
ing to  itself ;  for  it  was  announced  that  he  had  been 
one  of  the  " veteran  druggists  of  the  city,"  for 
although  he  was  under  sixty  when  he  died,  he  had 
been  a  druggist  in  the  Loop  for  nearly  forty  years, 
and  had  opened  his  store  on  the  second  floor  of  a 
building  at  Madison  Street  and  Fifth  Avenue,  thus 
being  "the  first  druggist  to  open  a  store  on  the 
second  floor  of  a  business  building  not  only  in  Chi- 
cago but  in  the  United  States." 

Even  some  of  the  large  banks  of  the  city  are  on 
the  second  floors,  there  being  such  shortage  of 
ground  space  within  the  Loop. 

Bank  buildings  of  the  city  run  mainly  to  solidity 
and  costliness,  with  heavy  pillars  on  their  fronts. 
There  is,  for  example,  the  Northern  Trust,  with  its 
dozen  great  stone  columns  rising  from  the  second 
story  and  wreath-topped  in  stone.  There  is  the 
Illinois  Trust,  in  its  long  low  building  of  gray  stone, 
with  its  nine  mighty  Corinthian  pillars  in  the  center 
and  half  a  dozen  Corinthian  pilasters  at  either  side. 
And  looking  down  narrow  Quincy  Street,  beside  this 
building,  one  sees  highset  pillars  above  an  open 
balustrade  of  stone,  and,  towering  far  above  and 
behind  them,  the  great  dome  of  the  post-office,  mak- 
ing in  all  an  impressive  vistaed  view.  The  lofty 
Pantheon-like  Central  Trust  is  fronted  by  tall 
pillars;  the  interior  is  an  open  skylighted  space, 
with  marble  and  pilasters,  with  bronze  doors  palm- 
leaf  paneled.  There  is  a  floor  of  black  and  white 
tesselation — one  comes  to  think  of  the  Loop  as  a 

74 


THE  LOOP  HOUNDS 

district  of  black  and  white  marble  floors! — and 
around  the  upper  part  of  the  interior  is  a  series  of 
lunettes  with  paintings  representing  scenes  in  the 
history  of  Chicago.  And  there  it  is  again :  always, 
the  importance  of  the  history  of  the  city;  business 
of  to-day  interwoven  with  that  intense  feeling  for  the 
city's  past.  Another  of  the  banks  has  four  bronzes 
depicting  scenes  in  the  career  of  Father  Marquette, 
because  that  famous  man  was  for  a  brief  space  a 
Chicagoan. 

One  of  the  new  perils  that  have  come  with  a  new 
world  was  shown,  one  day,  in  1919,  when  an  airplane 
dropped  through  the  big  skylight  of  one  of  these  big 
financial  buildings,  carrying  with  it  death  and  de- 
struction. 

Another  of  the  bank  buildings  has  entrances  of 
square  patterned  bronze,  with  yellow  granite  sup- 
ports to  the  building  and  yellow  granite  pillars  ris- 
ing from  the  second  floor ;  and  on  either  side  of  the 
entrance  is  a  bronze  entablatured  lion,  of  heroic  size. 
And  that  illustrates  a  cheerful  idiosyncrasy  of  the 
city:  the  representation  in  bronze  or  stone  of  ani- 
mals and  birds.  Lions  are  favorites ;  but  I  remem- 
ber noticing,  twenty  stories  in  air,  a  row  of  little 
stone  owls.  Another  building  has  an  owl  upon  the 
peak  of  a  Gothic  gable.  I  remember,  too,  a  dome 
surrounded  by  eagles.  Another  building,  not  to  fol- 
low tamely,  has  little  stone  human  figures,  far  up 
aloft,  out  of  sight  except  from  the  windows  of  a 
higher  adjoining  building. 

One  day  I  did  a  little  dog  hunting  within  the 

75 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

Loop ;  or,  at  least,  I  hunted  for  a  bronze  dog.  For 
I  learned  that,  a  good  many  years  ago,  while  his 
name  and  fame  were  still  to  be  made,  St.  Gaudens 
modeled  a  dog  as  an  advertisement,  or  a  sort  of 
trademark,  for  one  of  the  big  express  companies; 
and  I  searched  and  inquired,  thinking  that  such  an 
odd  thing  must  by  somebody  be  known  about;  but 
everywhere  I  met  with  ignorance  of  it.  There  had 
been  at  least  one  removal  of  the  offices;  there  had 
come  indifference.  Then,  long  afterwards,  came 
the  doing  away  with  private  management  during  the 
period  of  public  ownership  disorganization.  The 
dog  may  still  be  trailed  and  found ;  but  he  is  not  one 
of  the  Loop  Hounds,  after  all,  for  he  is  a  Loop  Bull- 
dog. 

La  Salle  Street  is  the  Wall  Street  of  Chicago,  and 
as  with  New  York,  the  financial  district  includes  not 
only  the  street  that  gives  name  to  the  district,  but 
some  adjoining  streets  also. 

The  Board  of  Trade  building,  at  the  very  edge  of 
La  Salle  Street,  on  West  Jackson  Boulevard,  is  not 
in  keeping  with  the  wealth  and  dignity  of  the  bank- 
ing and  commercial  buildings.  It  is  ornate  and  un- 
beautiful,  of  a  mixed  style  of  architecture,  with  two 
tall  stone  women  over  the  entrance  and  with  a  sort 
of  pointed  effect  from  some  little  towers  that  barely 
rise  higher  than  the  roof.  But  I  turn  to  a  Chicago 
publication  and  find  that  this  building  and  its  hall 
are  "undoubtedly  the  grandest  of  the  kind  in  the 
world."  However,  the  wealth  of  Chicago  nowa- 

76 


LIBRARY 
OF  THE 

OF  ILLINOIS 


THE  LOOP  HOUNDS 

days  understands  the  beauties  of  architecture,  and 
a  new  building  is  expected  to  be  built. 

What  makes  the  Board  of  Trade  building  notable 
is  that  it  holds  the  Wheat  Pit ;  which  is  not  a  sunken 
amphitheater  sort  of  place,  as  one  might  suppose 
from  the  name,  but  a  place  far  from  sunken,  reached 
by  a  stairway  to  the  second  floor.  There  one  sees 
a  big  open  hall,  tall-windowed.  One  sees  masses  of 
excited  men.  One  hears  a  roar  of  sound,  a  rum- 
bling shouting,  strident  boom  of  human  voices,  ris- 
ing and  falling,  sinking  in  volume  only  to  break  into 
greater  and  more  vociferous  noise.  And,  intermit- 
tently, when  the  tumult  and  the  shouting  dies,  one 
hears  the  staccato  ticking  of  the  rows  of  telegraph 
instruments  off  at  one  side. 

At  regular  intervals  stand  four  big  platforms, 
each  three  steps  up  from  the  floor,  and  three  are  de- 
voted to  corn,  to  grain,  to  provisions,  and  the  other 
is  the  so-called  Wheat  Pit.  And  what  gigantic 
struggles  have  centered  there ! 

Unlike  other  cities,  there  are  few  landmarks 
noticeable  in  the  business  section.  The  absence  of 
open  squares  has  much  to  do  with  this,  the  absence 
of  monuments,  the  absence  of  noticeable  alternations 
of  highness  and  lowness  in  buildings.  There  is  a 
sense  of  singular  compactness  and  evenness  in  all 
the  street  scenes  in  the  heart  of  the  city.  And  ow- 
ing to  the  permeative  coal  smoke,  the  buildings  are 
colored  to  much  of  uniformity  as  to  black  and  drab ; 
and,  more  than  in  most  cities,  there  is  frequent 

77 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

repetition  of  the  same  names  over  drug  stores  and 
eating  houses  and  cigar  shops  and  haberdashers,  be- 
longing to  chains  of  similar  shops,  so  that  many  a 
stranger  becomes  bewildered,  by  encountering  the 
same  name  and  the  same  window  display,  at  right 
and  left  and  around  the  corner,  in  a  short  walk  in 
the  busy  part  of  the  city. 

Alleys  are  frequent,  between  the  main  streets,  but 
altogether  without  picturesque  appearance,  and 
without  distinctive  life  of  their  own.  That  they  are 
an  aid  in  loading  trucks,  and  that  they  uncomfort- 
ably break  the  level  walking  for  those  on  the  side- 
walks, is  about  all  that  can  be  said  for  them. 

And  yet,  I  remember  a  picturesque  spot,  off  La 
Salle  Street,  where  an  alleyway,  bordered  by  tall 
buildings  of  tawny  brick,  leads  to  and  through  and 
under  a  building  of  brown :  and  I  remember  another 
spot  where  an  alleyway,  almost  picturesque,  is 
blocked  at  its  end,  almost  quaintly,  by  a  small  pillar- 
fronted  building. 

To  quite  a  degree,  businesses  of  a  kind  flock  to- 
gether within  the  Loop.  As,  furniture  dealers  are 
gregarious,  and  so  are  dealers  in  pianos  and  harps ; 
and  the  harps  of  Chicago  are  played  everywhere  but 
in  heaven !  Gregarious  also  are  those  who  sell 
plants  and  seeds.  And  here  is  the  beginning  of  an 
advertisement  of  one  of  the  seed  houses,  and  I  quote 
it  because  of  its  racy  Chicagoism : 

"Nature's  factory  whistle  is  blowing.  Can't  you  hear 
it?  It  is  the  morning  song  of  the  robin  calling  to  you  to 
start  your  garden.  The  earth  is  waking.  The  first  green 

78 


THE  LOOP  HOUNDS 

tints  of  growing  things  suggest  messes  of  tender  peas, 
bunches  of  spicy,  baby  radishes  and  onions,  new  beans, 
spinach,  chard  and  tomatoes." 

In  the  buildings  that  are  used  for  a  multitude  of 
indoor  shops  there  is  some  attempt  at  getting 
people  of  a  kind  together;  in  one  corridor  osteo- 
paths are  noticeable;  in  another,  music  wails  from 
every  room,  -these  being  haunts  of  music  teachers ; 
in  certain  corridors  one  notices  only  perfumery  or 
drugs. 

So  solid  is  the  general  appearance  of  the  Loop 
that  two  facts  in  regard  to  it  are  extraordinary: 
one  being,  that  many  of  the  buildings  are  put  up 
on  leased  land — but  the  leases  are  mostly  for  ninety 
nine  years,  and  I  suppose  that  to  the  typical  busy 
Chicagoan  a  century  ahead  has  seemed  an  incred- 
ible time,  short  though  has  been  the  century  just 
past.  The  other  fact  is  that  this  so  solid  seeming 
city  is  mainly  built  on  made  ground.  For  the  city 
was  too  low  for  drainage.  It  had  to  be  set  higher. 
And  in  Chicago,  to  realize  the  necessity  of  doing  a 
thing  is  usually  to  do  it  forthwith.  The  project 
was  decided  upon  in  1857  and  in  spite  of  appalling 
difficulties  was  carried  into  effect.  "  Every  build- 
ing in  the  city  must  be  raised  the  height  of  the 
mayor,  and  he  is  six  feet  seven,"  declared  a  news- 
paper humorously.  Later,  another  raising  was 
found  to  be  necessary.  On  the  whole,  great  areas  of 
the  city  have  been  raised  from  eight  to  fifteen  feet. 

The  Tremont  House  of  1857  was  one  that  had  to  be 
raised.  It  was  four  stories  high,  of  brick  and  stone. 

79 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

A  stranger,  arriving  from  the  East,  heard  of  the 
predicament  from  the  sorely  troubled  proprietor, 
and  said,  "I'll  do  it  for  you;  and  your  guests  will 
not  miss  a  single  meal  or  a  wink  of  sleep. ' '  Where- 
upon he  placed  five  thousand  jackscrews  under  the 
building  and  set  over  a  thousand  men  at  work,  and 
the  building  rose,  inch  by  inch,  and  the  foundation 
mounted  beneath  it  as  it  rose.  And  thus  the  task 
was  done.  The  man  who  thus  remarkably  began 
his  Chicago  career  was  George  M.  Pullman.  And  it 
is  odd  to  consider,  that  the  line  of  achievement  in 
which,  afterwards,  Pullman  won  worldwide  fame, 
was  based,  after  all,  upon  that  idea  of  not  letting 
people  "miss  a  single  meal  or  a  wink  of  sleep." 

A  serious  shortcoming  which  Chicago  had  to  face 
was  that  of  soil.  For  beneath  the  city  is  a  great 
bed  of  clay  which  shifts  and  moves  under  pressure, 
and  it  was  found  that  heavy  buildings  not  only 
sank,  but  raised  or  lowered  buildings  adjoining; 
and  as  buildings  must  become  still  larger  and 
heavier  the  only  remedy  was  to  use  unusual  pains 
and  go  to  unusual  depths  with  foundations. 

There  is  no  "Great  White  Way"  in  Chicago. 
There  are  bright  spots  at  night,  with  somewhat  of 
whirling  electric  signs  and  colored  lights,  but  no 
great  illumination  and  no  outward  indications  of 
particular  gayety.  Not  that  Chicago  is  a  sedate 
city,  at  night,  but  that  even  before  the  coming  of 
prohibition  there  was  no  particular  brightening  and 
lightening  of  the  ways. 

Hotels  are  more  a  vital  feature  of  Chicago  life 

80 


THE  LOOP  HOUNDS 

than  in  most  cities;  one  of  the  results  of  having  a 
crowded  life  within  the  Loop.  The  hotels  are  freely 
made  use  of  by  the  city  people  themselves  and  not 
only  by  visitors.  One  of  the  newest  and  biggest  is 
not  only  thronged  with  men  from  out  of  town,  but 
has  many  little  rooms  used  steadily  as  meeting 
places  or  lunching  places  by  this  or  that  formal  or 
informal  Chicago  organization.  Another  holds  it- 
self so  high  that  to  be,  say,  at  a  dance  there  is  almost 
equivalent  to  having  the  formal  sanction  of  society. 

You  enter  another  hotel  and  find  a  long  passage- 
way, where  everybody  meets  everybody,  a  place  full 
of  animation.  And  there  is  a  gorgeous  Pompeian 
room,  with  pillars  and  pilasters  of  black  and  white, 
and  wall  panels  of  brilliant  Pompeian  red,  and  there 
are  a  fountain  and  an  orchestra  playing  beside  a 
sunken  pool.  And  one  may  go  into  an  English 
room,  an  Elizabethan  room  with  dark  oak  and  high 
ceiling,  with  windows  of  leaded  glass,  a  room  of 
wonderful  effectiveness,  in  its  subdued  lights  and 
its  grave  beauty,  and  you  think  of  Haddon  Hall  and 
Knole. 

And  there  is  still  the  famous  Palmer  House,  with 
its  salmon-colored  walls,  which  was  long  thought  to 
represent  the  last  word  in  hotel  achievement.  An 
English  traveler  set  down  more  than  a  quarter  of  a 
century  ago,  that  he  was  told  it  was  "the  finest  hotel 
in  the  finest  city  on  God  Almighty's  earth. "  Both 
Palmer  and  Mrs.  Palmer  stood  high,  and  being  a 
hotel  keeper  was  not  permitted  to  be  any  drawback. 
On  the  contrary,  Palmer  set  his  name,  "Potter 

81 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

Palmer,"  plainly  and  prominently  upon  the  Palmer 
House.  In  Chicago,  hotelkeeping  may  still  bring 
substantial  public  prominence:  the  Sherman  who 
gave  name  to  the  Sherman  House  was  three  times 
mayor  of  this  city. 

The  invention  of  the  free  lunch  has  always  been 
claimed  for  a  Chicagoan,  and  to  another  has  been 
given  such  distinction  as  may  come  from  the  quick 
lunch.  And  many  a  Chicagoan  has  felt  intense 
civic  pride  in  these  claims,  for  the  city  is  markedly 
a  gustatory  city,  a  city  with  the  love  of  eating,  a  city 
devoted  to  viands. 

Everywhere  in  the  city,  throughout  its  length  and 
breadth,  there  is  an  astonishing  number  of  eating 
places.  Nor  does  this  mean  that  people  have  no 
home  life.  It  means  devotion  to  eating  and  to  the 
pleasant  sociability  of  eating  in  public  places.  And 
the  feature  is  most  strongly  marked  within  the 
limits  of  the  Loop.  Wherever  you  look,  in  this 
central  section  you  see  some  eating  place.  They 
are  on  corners  and  between  blocks,  they  are  on  side- 
walk level  and  upstairs  and  in  basements:  cafe- 
terias, restaurants,  waffle  shops,  with  rivalry  in  not- 
distinguished  names.  There  are  the  Universal, 
the  Wonder,  the  Ontra,  there  are  the  Bed  Star 
and  the  Puritan;  there  are  the  Pony  and  the  Little 
Gem;  one  offers  "Quick  Lunch  for  Bizzy  Business 
Men:  Eat  it  and  Beat  it;"  numbers  have  but  a 
single  word  over  the  doors,  "Eat."  To  the  thou- 
sands that  you  casually  see,  add  the  dining-rooms 
in  the  hotels  and  clubs,  and  the  dining-rooms  tucked 

82 


THE  LOOP  HOUNDS 

away  in  business  blocks,  and  the  vast  dining-rooms 
of  the  department  stores,  and  it  is  amazing. 

And  I  remember  a  restaurant  that  seems  as  if 
transplanted  direct  from  some  French  provincial 
city,  where  the  leathery-faced  proprietor  stands  be- 
hind his  own  mahogany  comptoir,  where  there  are 
formal  lambrequins  of  velvet  and  gold  over  the 
windows,  where  a  little  fat  bus  boy  brings  in  the 
silver-domed  meat;  with  always  the  very  atmos- 
phere of  France,  not  unlikely  added  to  by  the  en- 
trance of  a  couple  of  French  officers  in  their  uni- 
forms of  horizon  blue.  And  the  wife  and  the  daugh- 
ter of  the  proprietor  come  in,  and  he  quietly  sits 
down  to  dine  with  them  at  a  table  next  the  comptoir. 


CHAPTER  VII 


STREETS   AND    WAYS 


HAT  the  streets  of  Chi- 
cago were  long  and  flat 
and  without  end  and 
that  they  impressed 
him  with  a  great  hor- 
ror was  how  the  author 
of  "Plain  Tales  from 


the   Hills" 
in    making 


expressed  it 
vain    wails 
plains.    But 
the     fleeting 


of    visiting 


from     the 

after    all, 

impressions 

authors  need  not  be  taken  too  seriously  by  any  city. 
Our  own  Hawthorne  wrote  quite  similarly  regarding 
what  seemed  to  him  the  immense  dreariness  of 
London,  but  I  never  heard  that  London  was  particu- 
larly overcome  by  it.  Probably,  in  the  case  of  both 
men,  it  was  a  matter  of  getting  tired  and  having 
their  feet  hurt  them,  and  homely  explanations  are 
often  the  best. 

Although  there  are  great  areas  of  quiet  in  Chi- 
cago, as  in  the  region  of  the  Gold  Coast,  the  city 
on  the  whole  gives  an  impression  of  noise,  and  I 
am  inclined  to  think  that  this  is  because  the  average 

84 


STBEETS  AND  WAYS 

Chicagoan  has  an  actual  love  for  noise,  deeming  it, 
subconsciously,  as  necessarily  and  pridefully  a  con- 
comitant of  a  city's  energy  and  success.  Walk  on 
the  sidewalk,  in  the  central  portion  of  the  city,  and 
you  cannot  hear  your  companion  speak.  Ride  in  a 
street  car  and  you  will  find  conversation  impossible. 
The  noise  of  the  trolley  cars  is  terrific,  particularly 
at  the  unusually  frequent  switch  intersections. 
Flat  wheels,  with  their  pounding  jar,  are  common. 
Never,  elsewhere,  do  you  hear  so  many  shrieking 
automobile  brakes,  nowhere  else  is  there  such  a  clat- 
ter of  broken  chains  on  the  wheels.  The  delivery 
of  coal  at  a  high-class  apartment  house  is  likely  to 
be  made  the  occasion  of  a  carnival  of  noise.  Open 
a  window,  and  a  thunder  of  sound  comes  up. 

There  is  a  general  sense  of  free-and-easiness,  yet 
it  does  not  show  itself  in  the  supposedly  "  Western " 
style  of  dress.  The  Chicago  business  man  dresses 
like  the  business  man  of  the  East,  except,  now  and 
then,  for  a  hat  with  a  slightly  broader  brim.  But 
it  is  quite  noticeable  that  the  average  Chicago  busi- 
ness man  has  a  more  alert  and  forceful  facial  ex- 
pression and  a  better  general  air  than  has  the 
average  business  man  of  the  East.  A  city  does  not 
make  such  strides  as  this  city  has  made  without  the 
striders  showing  it. 

The  average  policeman  does  have  somewhat  of  an 
easy-going  air,  compared  with  the  police  of  most 
older  cities.  In  height  and  build  he  is  much  like 
the  New  York  policeman  of  the  nineties,  before  the 
coming  in  of  so  many  foreigners,  and  their  accession 

85 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

in  large  numbers  to  the  New  York  force,  lowered 
there  the  old-time  American — or  Irish! — physical 
standard. 

If  one  does  really  notice  an  apparent  heedless- 
ness  on  the  part  of  a  Chicago  policeman,  one  must 
also  notice  that  it  disappears  in  an  instant  when 
there  is  anything  to  do :  it  is  worth  while  to  see  him 
stop  a  speeder  or  some  other  traffic  violator  or 
gather  up  a  blown-off  hat,  at  the  very  moment  when 
he  might  be  thought  to  be  wrapped  in  thought. 
And  policemen  in  general,  here,  seem  favorable  to 
motorists.  At  a  busy  crossing,  in  a  time  of  busy 
traffic,  a  car  stalled  at  a  crossing.  There  were  only 
two  young  women  in  the  car,  and  within  twenty 
seconds  twenty  men  were  helping,  or  at  least  crowd- 
ing in  an  effort  to  help.  One  raised  the  radiator 
cover,  another  peered  beneath  the  car.  One  came 
with  gasoline,  one  with  oil,  one  with  a  wrench,  an- 
other with  a  screwdriver,  others  with  nothing  at  all 
but  the  determination  to  aid.  The  policeman  on 
crossing-post  was  master  of  ceremonies  and  let 
traffic  fume  and  wait.  And  the  two  girls  sat  de- 
mure and  quiet;  and  perhaps  it  should  be  added 
that  they  were  unusually  pretty. 

The  average  of  good  looks,  among  what  one  terms 
the  " higher"  classes  of  Chicago  women,  is  very 
high;  in  this,  the  city  stands  second  to  only  one. 
The  women  clerks  and  stenographers  are,  in  gen- 
eral, alert,  self-possessed,  capable,  pleasant  to  look 
at,  very  feminine  rather  than  strong-minded  in 
type. 

86 


STREETS  AND  WAYS 

The  'buses  of  a  line  along  the  lake  shore  are  in 
a  double  sense  vehicles  of  discussion  on  the  part  of 
women  and  girls.  One  day,  on  a  seat  on  the  roof, 
immediately  behind  me,  the  conversation  ranged 
from  Mozart  to  the  dramatic  poets;  but  such  pro- 
fundity did  not  keep  them  from  very  humanly 
switching  to  the  clothes  of  a  friend:  "She  has 
beautiful  furs!  But  you  know"  an  awed  pause — 
"she  paid  for  them  on  the  installment  plan!" 
There  are  such  naive  confidences  as  "I  don't  care  for 
'anything  but  reading  and  dancing";  a  combination 
not  met  with  in  many  places;  and  one  day,  directly 
in  my  ear:  "I  want  to  write  a  good  short  story 
and  have  money  of  my  own." 

It  is  often  said  that  Chicago  is  not  a  colorful 
city ;  and  the  grayish  black  to  which  soft  coal  smoke 
from  myriad  house  chimneys  and  railway  engines 
and  factories  has  reduced  so  much  of  the  city  has 
really  done  away  with  much  of  the  possibilities  of 
brilliancy  and  variety  of  color.  Arnold  Bennett 
meant  this  when  he  said  that  Chicago  reminded  him 
of  the  Five  Towns,  which  like  this  city,  are  remark- 
ably smoke  grimed.  And  he  looked  upon  Chicago 's 
smoky  air  as  a  mystifier  and  beautifier;  which  is 
certainly  making  a  merit  of  misfortune.  But  Chi- 
cago has  what  his  Five  Towns  do  not  have,  the 
bright  and  vivid  colorings  that  come  from  its  posi- 
tion on  the  shore  of  the  oftentimes  brilliant  lake. 
Another  English  visitor  went  home  and  wrote  of 
"murky,  grimy,  choky  Chicago." 

And  as  to  color — after  all,  it  may  be  found  here. 

87 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

There  comes  the  memory  of  seeing,  on  Monroe 
Street,  two  men  in  blue  overalls  and  jumpers,  load- 
ing green  bales  upon  a  high-sided  wagon  whose 
wheels  and  body  were  of  bright  yellow.  And  out 
on  the  western  outskirts  of  the  city  I  noticed  a 
Russian-like  effect  in  color,  a  warehouse  of  garish 
yellow  standing  in  the  middle  of  a  field  of  swamp 
grass  of  vivid  green.  Even  more  strong  color  con- 
trast was  in  the  Lake  Calumet  part  of  the  city,  where 
a  building  used  for  some  kind  of  lime-burning  work 
was  all  white  as  to  roofs  and  sides,  and  the  yard 
about  was  all  white,  too,  from  some  deposit  that  fell 
or  floated  through  the  air,  and  against  this  striking 
and  grim  whiteness,  rose  two  stacks  from  the  tops 
of  which  came  columns  of  excessively  black  smoke. 
And  some  recent  pictures  by  Joseph  Pennell  show 
unexpectedness  of  color  in  supposedly  commonplace 
portions  of  the  city. 

One  is  reminded  of  a  marked  difference  between 
the  Elevated  lines  of  New  York  and  those  of  Chi- 
cago, the  latter  running  largely  through  rights  of 
way,  rather  than  through  streets,  thus  giving  much 
of  unattractive  and  uninteresting  views  of  squalid 
back  yards  and  back  doors,  and  at  night  running 
through  darkness  instead  of  along  lighted  streets. 

Sunday  night  is  a  time  for  enjoyment.  The 
theaters,  at  least  the  greater  number,  are  open,  and 
the  advertising  lights  are  blazing,  and  the  billiard 
'rooms  are  brilliantly  lighted  along  their  lines  of 
tables,  which  are  in  full  view.  The  sidewalks  are 
thronged  in  a  quite  orderly  but  distinctly  gay 

88 


STREETS  AND  WAYS 

fashion,  although  not  so  gay  as  before  the  incoming 
of  recent  laws. 

Especially  in  those  amusement  and  shopping 
centers  which  are  away  from  the  heart  of  the  city 
is  Sunday  a  day  of  promenading,  motoring,  dining 
and  gayety.  Always  one  notices  these  distant 
centers  with  interest.  I  do  not  refer  to  villages, 
taken  into  the  city  with  small  centers  of  business 
life  already  in  existence,  growing  as  the  city  grows, 
but  centers  which  have  sprung  into  busy  and 
thronging  life  by  what  might  seem  chance.  And 
there  always  comes  to  mind,  more  than  others,  the 
extremely  busy  and  attractive  center  at  Broadway 
and  Lawrence  Avenue,  where  for  quite  a  region 
thereabouts  stores  have  arisen,  and  moving-picture 
theaters;  one  or  two  of  these  being  of  extremely 
high  standard  as  regards  general  plan  and  lavish- 
ness  of  expenditure.  Chicagoans  believe  that  there 
are  about  fifty  outlying  centers ;  but  visitors,  with- 
out in  the  least  doubting  the  statement,  do  not  hap- 
pen to  come  upon  so  many  as  that.  And,  curiously, 
these  local  centers  do  not  in  the  least  offset  the 
massed  centering  of  the  Loop. 

As  the  State  names  its  counties  after  dis- 
tinguished Americans,  so  the  city  similarly  names 
many  of  its  parks  and  streets;  and  it  helps  to  up- 
hold the  Americanism  that  one  notes  as  a  feature  of 
the  city.  Among  the  parks  are  Washington  and 
Lincoln,  Grant  and  Jackson,  McKinley  and  Garfield, 
and  among  the  streets  there  are,  as  with  the  parks, 
Washington  and  Lincoln  (the  city  does  not  tire  of 

89 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

Washington  and  Lincoln!)  and  a  host  of  others, 
such  as  Sherman  and  Sheridan,  Dewey  and  Custer 
and  Polk  and  Taylor,  Madison  and  Monroe  and 
Webster. 

The  name  of  California  is  given  to  an  avenue 
that  runs  for  many  miles,  and  Sacramento  is  also 
used  as  a  name,  there  being  a  strong  pro-California 
feeling  here,  but  New  York  is  quite  ignored  as  a 
name,  although  the  name  of  New  England  is  used. 
Western  Avenue  is  naturally  and  properly  the  long- 
est in  the  city,  reaching  from  the  southern  limits 
of  the  city  to  the  northern.  Foreign  names  are 
used  to  some  extent,  including  the  one  so  often 
called,  quite  simply  and  frankly,  "Goat"  Street; 
and  I  was  intrigued  by  the  name  of  Napoleon  some- 
where on  a  street  corner. 

It  is  odd  for  a  city  of  the  undoubted  independ- 
ence of  Chicago,  that  there  is  an  intense  following 
of  the  doings  of  the  very  rich;  an  idiosyncrasy 
which  shows  itself  markedly  in  the  "movies," 
where  every  action  of  wealthy  men  and  women  is 
watched  with  absorbed  attention,  and  whose  every 
motion,  every  act  or  gesture,  of  maid  or  valet,  of 
the  personal  servant,  is  observed  with  fascinated 
absorption. 

Some  of  the  smaller  politenesses,  little  nice- 
nesses,  Chicago  ignores.  For  example,  few  men 
take  off  their  hats  when  standing  on  the  street  in 
talk  with  a  lady.  But  hats-off  is  observed  in  eleva- 
tors the  moment  a  lady  enters.  Many  children  are 
allowed  to  be  lax  in  general  politeness  in  public 

90 


STREETS  AND  WAYS 

places ;  it  is  seldom  that  a  boy  or  girl  gives  up  a  seat 
in  a  street  car  for  an  old  man  or  even  for  a  gray- 
haired  lady.  Men  do  not  greatly  give  up  their  seats 
to  women,  but  this  is  coming  to  be  the  case  in  many 
cities,  through  the  insistence  of  women  themselves 
that  they  are  in  every  way  men 's  equals. 

In  a  street  car  one  day  I  noticed  an  extraordi- 
nary devotion  to  courtesy.  The  car  was  so  packed 
that  nobody  could  move  an  inch.  A  woman,  ad- 
mirably gowned,  was  quite  unconscious  of  the  fact 
that  one  of  her  hatpins  kept  touching  the  face  of  a 
man  standing  beside  her  and  unable  to  escape. 
After  quite  a  while  he  spoke,  but  even  this  was  not 
to  complain  of  his  own  injuries.  For  he  said, 
gently:  "Madam,  I  beg  your  pardon,  but  perhaps 
you  would  like  to  know  that  a  drop  of  blood  from 
my  cheek  is  on  the  shoulder  of  your  gown." 

The  surface  cars  are  so  run  and  managed  as  to  be 
a  matter  of  suffering,  but  some  day  Chicago  will 
doubtless  have  subways  like  other  great  cities,  or 
lines  of  motor  'buses.  Now  and  then  there  is  a  car 
with  a  few  vacant  seats;  and  at  such  time  I  have 
noticed  that  there  are  almost  sure  to  be  several 
men  and  women  standing,  swaying  and  staggering 
as  the  car  itself  sways  and  staggers,  and  not  taking 
any  of  the  seats!  One  helplessly  wonders  why. 
Recently  I  saw  this  oddity  commented  upon  in  one 
of  the  newspapers,  which  published  a  letter  asking 
if  it  could  be  explained  by  the  fear  of  spoiling  ex- 
pensive fur  coats.  To  this  another  observer 
triumphantly  replied  that  animals  themselves  wear 

91 


fur  coats  without  injuring  them.  Upon  which 
came  a  comment  from  the  editor,  dryly  suggesting 
that  a  visit  to  the  zoo  would  show  whether  or  not 
furred  animals  injure  their  coats  by  sitting  down. 

The  homes  and  business  offices  are  heated  per- 
fervidly;  and  I  have  wondered  if  this  has  anything 
to  do  with  the  baldness  so  common  among  youngish 
men.  And  one  wonders  also  where  the  old  men  go ! 
For  they  are  seldom  seen  except  a  few  as  exhibits 
at  meetings  of  the  Historical  Society. 

There  is  a  smaller  number  of  opticians  shops  to 
be  seen,  than  in  Boston  or  Philadelphia,  and  it 
naturally  follows  that  there  is  a  smaller  than  cus- 
tomary average  of  eye-glassed  men.  Although 
restaurants  are  incredibly  numerous,  the  number 
of  what  are  distinctively  known  as  grocery  stores 
seems  small;  at  least,  one  does  not  notice  many, 
although  there  are  many  of  the  type  termed  delica- 
tessen shops.  Candy  shops  are  common  and  so  are 
shops  for  ice  cream.  It  is  curious  to  notice  that 
artichokes  are  eaten  quite  commonly,  even  small 
shops  selling  them.  And  that  Chieagoans  are  very 
largely  farm  boys  and  farm  girls  grown  up  is  shown 
by  the  fact  that  so  many,  in  springtime,  love  to 
cany  home  little  bunches  of  sassafras  root,  the 
habit  being  apparently  a  survival  from  the  times 
when  every  household  held  firmly  to  the  tradition 
of  sassafras  as  a  " blood  purifier." 

There  is  a  noticeably  large  number  of  little  shops 
for  repairing  shoes.  The  astonishingly  large  num- 
ber of  drug  stores,  most  of  them  selling  "soft 

92 


STREETS  AND  WAYS 

drinks"  and  candy,  makes  for  close  competition; 
and  one  druggist  has,  at  his  shop  door,  a  ther- 
mometer with  shif table  frame;  with  this  he  makes 
the  weather  seem  a  little  colder  than  it  is  on  a  cold 
day  and  a  little  hotter  than  it  is  on  a  hot  day;  and 
people  are  so  pleased  to  see  a  thermometer  that 
expresses  their  feelings,  that  qnite  a  proportion  of 
those  who  stop  to  look  go  in  and  buy. 

Bordering  the  excellent  residential  sections  there 
are  a  great  many  fine  small  shops,  with  articles  for 
women  or  various  supplies  for  households;  small 
and  intimate  shops  which  it  is  pleasant  to  see  still 
in  existence  as  well  as  to  see  the  great  department 
stores.  Much  of  the  shopkeeping,  alike  in  little 
places  and  big,  is  positively  Parisian  in  standard, 
in  attractiveness  and  charm.  There  are  hat  shops 
of  French  exquisiteness.  And  in  the  window  of  at 
least  one  prominent  shop  is  "On  parle  Francois"; 
this  being  not  only  to  attract  such  French  as  may 
come  but  also  to  please  a  large  French  element  that 
settled  here  from  Canada. 

Chicago  uses  great  quantities  of  box  plants,  with- 
out roots,  in  hotel  and  theater  lobbies  and  as  supple- 
mentary foliage  in  flower  shops;  and  this  is  the 
more  noticeable  from  the  almost  sacredness  in 
which,  in  other  cities,  box  is  held. 

Horses  are  still  more  in  evidence  than  in  most 
large  cities ;  and  this  gave  a  recent  opportunity  for 
a  reporter,  describing  a  street  accident,  to  say  that 
the  horse  was  with  difficulty  "stood  up  on  its  four 
corners."  Perhaps  it  was  the  same  reporter  who, 

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THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

narrating  a  bit  of  local  heroism,  declared  that 
"Horatius  had  nothing  on  Jimmie." 

Chicago  has  such  oddities  as  houses  with  outside 
wooden  steps  up  to  the  second-story  front  doors — 
not  high  steps  to  a  merely  high  entrance,  but  steps 
leading  ladder-like  from  the  sidewalk  to  a  literal 
second-story  front  door.  It  is  presumably  an  idea 
retained  from  the  time  when  most  of  the  city  was 
swamp,  above  which  it  was  imperative  to  go.  It  is 
quite  a  feature  with  houses  in  the  humbler  districts, 
•and  on  an  afternoon  stroll  one  may  count  fifty  or 
sixty  of  such  houses.  There  are  square  miles  of 
rather  dingy,  detached  and  discouraged  dwellings 
built  of  wood,  but  they  are  more  homey  than  the 
human  hives  of  close-built  cities,  although  the 
dinginess  of  sooty  wood  lends  its  aid  to  discourage- 
ment. 

Overhanging  cornices,  in  the  business  section,  are 
permitted  to  drop  water  freely  on  the  unhappy 
pedestrians,  after  a  rain  or  when  snow  is  melting. 
Every  city  has,  from  necessity,  somewhat  of  this 
condition,  but  Chicago  suffers  particularly  even  in 
the  best  shopping  districts.  The  sidewalks  are  also 
allowed  to  become  sloppy,  after  a  snow,  and  the 
cleaning  of  the  sidewalks  does  not  appear  to  be 
closely  enforced,  and  the  alleyway  entrances  that 
frequently  cut  across  the  sidewalks  are  often  deep 
in  slush.  Often  there  is  an  unexpectedly  steep  step 
downwards  from  sidewalk  to  street  pavement. 
Wet  streets  are  largely  due  to  the  lowness  of  the 
city  levels ;  and  one  wonders,  in  all  seriousness,  why 

94 


STREETS  AND  .WAYS 

windmills  are  not  utilized,  as  wise  little  Holland 
would  utilize  them.  Chicago  has  the  wind!  There 
comes  a  general  impression  that  it  rains  very  easily 
here ;  and  indeed  there  are  often  sudden  rains  that 
may  turn  into  drenching  drives  and  go  roaring 
through  the  streets.  Nor  is  this  impression  of  easy 
rain  one  which  comes  only  to  visitors,  for  it  rains 
quite  through  "The  Pit,"  book  of  Chicago  by  a 
Chicagoan  that  it  is,  and  even  the  very  last  chapter 
begins,  ' '  The  evening  had  closed  in  wet  and  misty. ' ' 

Pavements  are  in  general  so  excellent  that  some 
very  bad  ones,  even  in  good  residential  districts, 
are  noticeable  by  contrast.  And  these  are  remind- 
ers of  the  early  days  when  all  the  streets  were  deep 
in  mud.  There  are  still  places  where,  after  a 
period  of  wet  weather,  one  thinks  of  the  oldest  of 
Chicago  stories,  about  a  pedestrian  noticing  the 
head  and  hat  of  General  Hart  Stewart  showing 
above  the  mud,  whereupon,  "You're  in  pretty  deep, 
General!";  to  which  the  reply:  "Great  Scott! 
I  Ve  got  a  horse  under  me ! ' '  And  one  needs  to  re- 
member not  only  that  the  city  level  has  been  raised 
but  that  up  to  the  middle  of  the  eighteen  hundreds 
there  were  no  sewers,  and  no  sidewalks  except  a  few 
planks.  Old  settlers  tell,  too,  of  water  being  sold 
by  the  bucketful,  that  being  the  drinking-water 
service  of  the  city. 

Chicago  has  no  home  district  close  to  the  business 
part  of  the  city,  that  being  a  result  of  the  solid  de- 
velopment of  business  within  a  definite  area,  for  it 
left  no  place  for  houses. 

95 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

Years  ago,  great  lumber  piles  covered  great  areas 
along  the  river  beds,  but  with  the  disappearance  of 
the  mighty  forests  of  the  neighboring  States  the 
piles  have  dwindled  to  comparative  nothingness. 

Chicago  is  a  city  of  homes.  And  somehow  the 
impression  of  an  old-time  friendliness  of  life  has 
been  retained;  the  comfortable,  homey  quality  of 
life.  And  in  spite  of  an  immense  influx  of 
foreigners  the  American  atmosphere  has  persisted, 
the  American  spirit  is  still  dominant. 

Even  when  the  homes  are  in  apartment  houses 
the  general  aspect  is  so  comfortable  that  the  home- 
like impression  remains.  There  are  plots  of  grass 
and  greenery  around  the  buildings.  The  homes  are 
detached,  instead  of  being  built  closely  shoulder  to 
shoulder.  Most  of  the  apartment  houses  also  have 
at  least  somewhat  of  lawn  and  greenery:  they 
average  four  stories  in  height,  and  are  generally  so 
arranged  that  the  rooms  are  grouped  about  a  center, 
instead  of  being  in  a  straight  line  like  the  cars  of 
a  railway  train.  There  are  also,  too,  some  great 
caravansary  apartment  houses,  tall  and  capacious. 
Huge  beachside  hotels,  for  both  winter  and  sum- 
mer living,  are  a  feature  of  life  here,  within  the  city 
limits  but  far  to  the  south  of  the  center  and  far  to 
the  north. 

Chicago  is  not  a  towered  or  spired  city ;  there  are 
few  in  all,  and  mostly  they  are  where  they  cannot 
readily  be  seen.  The  street  lights  are  admirable 
in  appearance,  in  their  round  white  globes  on  top 
of  well-made  poles ;  and  at  many  corners  there  are, 

96 


STREETS  AND  WAYS 

on  the  lampposts,  the  letters  "N,"  "S,"  "E,"  or 
"W,"  to  tell  strangers  the  points  of  the  compass. 

As  showing  one  of  the  piquant  contrasts  of  the 
city  there  comes  the  memory  of  a  night  following 
a  mayoralty  election.  The  day  had  been  one  of 
tremendous  excitement.  It  had  been  a  bitterly  con- 
tested struggle  with  an  almost  unprecedented  vote. 
Hundreds  of  thousands  of  ballots  were  cast.  That 
night,  huge  crowds  gathered  to  learn  the  result, 
especially  in  front  of  the  building  of  a  principal 
newspaper.  But  the  crowd  was  quiet!  Excite- 
ment and  interest  seemed  to  have  vanished.  Now 
and  then  came  a  cheer,  but  rather  as  if  perfunc- 
torily. Nor  was  this  because  of  doubt  as  to  result, 
for  very  early  it  was  seen  which  candidate  was  win- 
ning, nor  was  it  that  an  unpopular  man  had  won. 
It  was  a  decorous  street  gathering,  with  a  few  boys 
hovering  on  the  outskirts  of  the  throng  and  from 
time  to  time  spiritlessly  essaying  horns!  The  slo- 
gan of  the  winner  was  that  he  was  not  to  be 
" bought,  bluffed  or  bossed,"  and  that  was  an  ex- 
cellent example  of  Chicago's  excellent  advertising 
phraseology;  which  brief  political  phrasing  makes 
me  think  of  a  brief  religious  wording  on  a  placard 
in  front  of  one  of  the  churches:  "Only  once  a 
stranger. ' ' 

For  a  city  so  full  of  the  very  essence  of  animated 
existence,  it  is  odd  to  notice  the  great  attention  paid 
to  the  business  of  undertakers.  Of  course,  Chicago 
is  noted  for  its  undertakings ;  but  not  of  that  kind ! 
A  show  window  centered  with  a  gorgeous  ' '  casket ' ' 

97 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

is  certain  to  attract  a  constant  succession  of  awed 
and  intent  spectators.  And  there  are  such  adver- 
tisements as  "the  spirit  of  emotion  is  tenderly 
woven  into  every  bouquet  from  our  sympathetic 
hands."  At  the  same  time,  the  city  does  not  hold 
its  cemeteries  to  be  among  its  sights;  visitors  are 
not  taken  to  them  as  to  places  of  importance  and  in- 
terest ;  not  even  to  Graceland,  where  there  are  many 
of  the  most  famous  of  Chicagoans,  and  where  John 
Kinzie  and  his  descendants  rest ;  in  peace,  one  may 
hope,  although  to  judge  the  future  by  the  past,  the 
original  Kinzie  will  keep  on  moving,  Graceland 
having  been  attained  only  after  his  body  had  been 
several  times  disinterred  and  moved  on. 

As  a  local  description  has  it,  in  Graceland  "there 
are  presented  suggestive  features  which,  while  not 
inharmonious  with  the  purpose  of  a  necropolis,  are 
cheerful,  quieting  and  restful."  Although  one  may 
wonder  under  which  heading  comes  the  startling 
statement,  in  a  description  of  one  of  the  tombs,  that 
"Five  persons  are  now  enclosed  within  its  solid 
walls"! 

The  city  cannot  help  being  black  so  long  as  the 
smoke  is  permitted.  And  if  you  notice  stenog- 
raphers lean  out  of  high  office  windows  to  catch 
sight  of  something  in  the  street  below,  you  will  at 
the  same  time  notice  that  they  first  lay  paper  on 
the  sill,  to  keep  their  hands  clean.  Much  in  the  city 
being  grim  and  grimy  makes  it  the  more  noticeable 
that  such  a  proportion  of  men  wear  white  stockings, 
as  if  in  defiance.  Yet  laundry  is  handled  but 

98 


slowly.  Glove-cleaners,  in  this  city  where  gloves 
are  so  quickly  soiled,  expect  to  take  a  week  for 
cleaning,  or  think  it  a  special  dispensation  to  do  it 
in  four  days:  the  twenty-four  hour  glove  service 
of  other  cities  is  unknown. 

The  iron  boxes  on  the  curbs,  about  two  and  a  half 
feet  long  and  eighteen  inches  high,  are  not  pirate 
chests,  although  they  give  that  picturesque  re- 
minder, but  are  what  they  are  marked  as  being,  aids 
in  keeping  the  city  clean.  They  are  usually  so  per- 
versely placed  that,  to  lift  the  cover  to  drop  in  litter, 
one  must  leave  the  sidewalk  and  go  into  the  gutter; 
but  the  people  take  pains  to  do  this.  But  another 
use  for  them  is  advantage  points  for  standing  upon 
to  see  a  parade  or  any  excitement. 

Although  there  is  much  of  effort  to  keep  many  of 
the  streets  clean,  many  others  are  neglected.  And 
vacant  lots  are  likely  to  be  entirely  neglected.  That 
wagons  are  permitted  to  be  parked,  throughout  the 
night,  in  vacant  lots,  is  an  astonishing  survival  for 
so  highly  civilized  a  city.  And  a  habit  in  some 
parts  of  the  city,  of  throwing  refuse  matter  upon 
vacant  lots,  does  not  represent  the  best  possible 
method  of  garbage  disposal. 

The  city  of  Edinburgh,  in  the  Middle  Ages  and 
up  to  within  less  than  a  century  ago,  permitted  the 
throwing  of  refuse  from  the  windows  of  the  many- 
storied  houses  whose  quaintness  gives  such  charm. 
And  modern  Chicago  seems  to  have  tried,  at  least 
in  some  parts  of  it,  to  simulate  that  ancient  custom 
of  an  ancient  city.  For  a  recent  superintendent  of 

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THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

police,  according  to  a  publication  of  one  of  the 
women's  clubs  under  date  of  1917,  sent  out  a  notice 
directing  his  officers  to  check  "the  throwing  of  gar- 
bage from  the  windows  of  the  first,  second  and  third 
floors  of  buildings  to  streets  and  alleys."  But  why 
such  favoritism  to  the  fourth! 


100 


CHAPTER  VIII 


CLUBS   ABE   TRUMPS 

LUBS  are 
trumps  in  Chi- 
cago !  Every- 
body belongs 
to  a  club ; 
everybody  that 
i  s  clubable, 
that  is,  to  use 
a  word  beloved 
of  Doctor 
Johnson.  Most 
men  and  women 
belong  to  sev- 
eral  clubs. 
And  there  are  some  belong  to  many  clubs. 

All  the  principal  clubs  except,  of  course,  the 
country  clubs,  are  close  together  and  close  to  every- 
thing in  the  heart  of  the  city.  Within  a  radius  of 
less  than  a  mile,  within  a  few  minutes'  walking  dis- 
tance from  the  banks,  from  the  wholesale  and  retail 
stores,  from  the  Art  Institute,  from  the  Public  Li- 
brary, the  clubs  are  located.  They  are  busily  used. 
Business  men,  authors,  artists,  bankers — at  noon 

101 


and  in  the  evening  they  are  in  these  clubs.  Clubs 
long  ago  became  an  intimate  feature  of  +he  daily 
life  of  Chicago. 

There  is  a  mingling  of  classes  which  is  unknown 
elsewhere  in  anything  like  the  same  degree,  and 
which  is  of  vast  importance  to  a  city  that  would  re- 
main open-eyed  and  possess  continuously  the  vigor 
of  youth.  At  a  club  where  a  stranger  would  expect 
to  meet,  for  example,  only  writers,  he  will  find,  be- 
side the  latest  poet,  the  oldest  bank  president,  be- 
side the  author  of  a  novel  of  Chicago  life  will  be  a 
dealer  in  laces  or  leather.  And  if  he  goes  into  a 
business  man's  club  he  will  find,  in  conversation 
with  a  lawyer  fresh  from  his  case  in  court,  a  writer 
whose  work  has  attracted  national  attention,  he  will 
notice  the  head  of  a  department  store  or  a  promi- 
nent architect  in  conf abulative  talk  with  an  editorial 
writer  from  one  of  the  newspapers.  The  meeting 
and  mingling  of  engineers,  architects,  artists,  mer- 
chants, manufacturers,  novelists,  essayists,  para- 
graphists,  poets,  makes  of  the  clubs  a  unique  and 
powerful  force.  Every  one  finds  an  opportunity  to 
give  and  receive  ideas.  And  each  club,  though  a 
meeting  place  for  various  classes,  holds  to  its  own 
distinctive  line  and  develops  most  strongly  along 
that  line. 

Club  characteristics  which  supposedly  belong 
only  to  some  old  city  with  a  long-established  society, 
as  a  London,  a  Philadelphia,  are  found  to  be  firmly 
established  here.  Here  are  clubs  of  exclusiveness, 
clubs  the  majority  of  whose  members  are  men  of 

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CLUBS  AEE  TRUMPS 

settled  position,  literary  clubs  which  seem  of  as  firm 
consistency  and  of  as  excellent  flavor  as  if  long 
periods  of  time  had  gone  into  their  making.  Even 
the  newer  clubs  quickly  take  on  an  air  as  of  stability 
and  age.  And  there  are  noble  club  buildings  which 
would  honor  any  city  of  the  world.  And,  the  city 
not  being  possessed  of  the  mania  of  moving  on,  hav- 
ing no  " uptown"  bee  in  its  civic  bonnet,  there  is  a 
feeling  of  permanency  in  the  location  of  the  clubs 
which  is  very  restful.  And  already  there  are  clubs 
in  which,  to  gain  membership,  one  must  join  a 
lengthening  line  of  aspirants:  one  of  the  big  clubs 
has  a  waiting  list  of  twenty-two  hundred. 

But  there  are  clubs  and  clubs.  There  are  some 
whose  memberships  are  frequently  advertised,  to 
sell  or  to  buy.  The  newspapers  run  a  regular  ad- 
vertisement section  of  "Club  and  Association  Mem- 
berships" and  in  it  the  names  of  a  few  clubs  of  repu- 
tation sometimes  figure. 

Instead  of  being  sleepy  places  for  sleepy  men,  or 
mere  places  for  imbedding  oneself  in  an  easy  chair 
to  read  the  newspapers  and  magazines,  or  places 
for  gossip  and  scandal — although  there  are  doubt- 
less elements  of  all  these — the  clubs  of  Chicago  are 
vivid  with  mental  life.  The  club  rooms  are  just  as 
quiet  and  restful  as  those  of  other  cities;  they  are 
not  in  the  least  noisy  with  conversation  or  argu- 
ment; but  they  are  really  meeting  and  thinking 
places,  as  well  as  places  with  a  full  proportion  of 
comforts.  Most  of  them  have  highly  popular  din- 
ing rooms  and  their  being  so  centrally  convenient 

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THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

for  noonday  getting  together  is  of  high  importance. 
But  they  are  not  merely  places  where  men  make 
two  chins  grow  where  only  one  grew  before. 

Benjamin  Franklin,  with  his  Junto,  made  one  of 
the  aims  of  that  remarkable  club  the  welcoming  to 
the  city  of  visitors;  and  this  idea  is  finely  carried 
out  in  Chicago ;  and  many  a  traveler  goes  home  and 
declares  that  in  the  city  of  Chicago  he  found  the 
finest  hospitality  in  the  world.  I  recollect  having 
heard  this  said  as  far  away  as  in  England  and  in 
France. 

Women  are  prominent  in  the  club  life  of  Chicago : 
and  not  only  as  charming  figures  in  the  women's 
dining  rooms  of  the  men's  clubs,  or  at  the  tea-hour 
in  their  own.  Their  club  rooms,  like  those  of  the 
men,  are  within  the  circumscribed  limits  of  the  busi- 
ness center,  and  their  clubs  busy  themselves  in  mat- 
ters of  art  and  literature,  in  matters  of  home-mak- 
ing or  social  concern,  in  matters  of  public  good  or 
public  evil. 

The  oldest  club  for  women,  among  those  that 
stand  for  civic  service,  is  the  Chicago  Woman's 
Club,  and  in  its  half  century  of  existence  (it  was 
founded  in  1876)  it  has  made  an  ever-lengthening 
record  of  achievement  in  arousing  public  opinion. 
It  has  from  the  first  been  an  organized  center  of 
civic  initiative  and  inspiration.  And  the  club  feels 
pride  in  the  fact  that  within  it  originated  the  idea 
of  the  National  Federation  of  Women's  Clubs. 
With  its  more  than  thirteen  hundred  members,  the 
club  has  thus  far  gone  on  without  a  building  of  its 

104 


THE  MULLION-WINDOWED  UNIVERSITY  CLl'B 


1  f?     iY 

OF    I  HE 

UNIVERSITY  OF  ILLINOIS 


CLUBS  ARE  TRUMPS 

own,  but  has  had  commodious  quarters  in  one  of 
the  great  office  buildings  facing  the  lake;  but  as  I 
write  plans  are  well  toward  completion  for  the  put- 
ting up  of  a  new  building  to  be  exclusively  the  prop- 
erty of  this  club. 

Among  the  numerous  delightful  women's  clubs — 
I  was  about  to  alter  that,  and  say  "delightful  clubs 
for  women,"  when  it  occurred  to  me  that  the  first 
phraseology  was  the  better  after  all — I  may  men- 
tion one  of  the  newer  ones,  the  Cordon,  energetic, 
with  a  membership  of  well  over  five  hundred  and 
with  a  thoroughly  delightful  atmosphere.  I  do  not 
remember  being  told  of  a  specific  purpose  except 
to  be  an  excellent  club.  Its  rooms  are  in  the  Fine 
Arts  building,  with  a  pair  of  entrance  doors  of 
carved  oak,  as  excellent  in  effect  as  if  from  some 
Spanish  or  Italian  grandee's  home  of  the  Renais- 
sance. A  room  for  dining  has  a  monastic  effect, 
with  a  raised  floor  at  one  end,  with  a  sort  of  "above 
the  salt"  table.  Walls  and  arches  are  in  buff- 
plaster,  and  there  are  tables  and  chairs  of  mellow 
brown  oak.  The  china  has  a  narrow  black  haw- 
thorn border.  And  another  long  room  parallel  to 
this  is  all  a  greeny-blue  as  to  chairs,  with  portraits 
of  Italian  ladies — we  all  love  Simonetta! — and  the 
fair  faces  of  the  Renaissance. 

The  Fortnightly  is  in  the  Fine  Arts  building ;  and 
notabie  is  its  meeting  room,  large  and  rectangular, 
with  high-coved  ceiling.  It  is  of  very  quiet  effect, 
with  creamy  walls,  and  a  raised  platform  backed  by 
green-toned  tapestry.  The  especial  feature  is  the 

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THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

presentation  of  important  subjects  by  important 
people.  When  tea  is  served  in  quiet  Canton  china, 
it  is  in  a  small  room  that  has  old  and  lovely  furni- 
ture. This  club  seems  to  average  an  unusual 
number  of  women  of  wealth  and  acknowledged  posi- 
tion and  to  stand  for  the  quiet  and  conservative  in 
taste. 

At  the  Fortnightly  and  at  some  of  the  other  clubs, 
I  noticed  much  of  real  lace,  in  collars  and  neck 
garniture,  very  quiet,  not  widespread  shoulder  dis- 
play, and  mainly  worn  by  elderly  ladies  and  young 
matrons.  There  were  Venetian,  Brussels,  Honi- 
ton ;  and  I  think  more  of  it  is  worn  and  prized  here, 
as  in  England,  than  in  any  other  American  city 
that  I  have  noticed. 

The  Eleanor  clubs  are  for  self-supporting  girls, 
offering  opportunity  to  sit  and  read  or  talk,  and 
to  meet  callers,  and  where  a  girl  may  be  accom- 
panied by  a  brother  or  a  man  friend  in  the  dining 
room.  The  central  club  occupies  practically  an  en- 
tire floor  of  an  office  building  in  the  business  center, 
with  a  membership  of  over  eighteen  hundred;  and 
there  are  branch  club  houses  in  various  parts  of 
the  city  where  girls  may  live  who  do  not  have  homes 
of  their  own. 

In  Chicago,  there  is  the  Beresford  Cat  Club,  and 
there  are  more  than  a  dozen  Households  of  Ruth, 
and  there  is  a  branch  of  the  Daughters  of  Isabella, 
and  there  are  three  Councils  of  the  Degree  of 
Pocahontas,  and  there  are  a  number  of  branches 
of  the  Knights  and  Ladies  of  Security,  and  there  is 

106 


CLUBS  ARE  TRUMPS 

the  Prince  of  Wales  Chapter  of  the  Imperial  Order 
of  the  Daughters  of  the  British  Empire.  There 
are  various  Tents  of  the  Daughters  of  Veterans, 
and  there  are  also  Daughters  of  the  Confederacy. 

It  is  astonishing  and  it  is  remindful  of  what 
mingling  of  blood  went  into  the  making  of  Chicago 
and  from  what  proud  American  ancestry  came  the 
makers  of  the  city,  to  find  that  here  are  organiza- 
tions, strongly  entrenched,  such  as  one's  first 
thought  would  scarcely  draw  away  from  the  Thir- 
teen Original  States!  For  here  are  the  Daughters 
of  the  Revolution,  and  here  is  a  branch  of  the 
Society  of  Colonial  Wars,  and  here  are  even  May- 
flower descendants. 

The  Colonial  Dames  are  also  here,  in  this  new 
city,  and  they  have  established  an  American  His- 
tory scholarship  at  the  University  of  Chicago,  and 
are  working  steadily  to  increase  patriotism, 
through  aiming  to  give  an  understanding  of  Ameri- 
can institutions  and  ideals  to  foreigners  of  the  city, 
by  means  of  many  lectures,  by  the  buying  and  dis- 
tribution of  books,  and  by  interesting  school 
teachers  in  the  work. 

The  Arts  Club,  in  its  location  on  Michigan  Boule- 
vard high  up  in  an  office  building,  is  one  of  the 
examples  of  the  extraordinary  results  that  can  be 
attained,  without  building  especially  but  by  utiliz- 
ing what  may  be  found.  There  is  a  room,  high  and 
long,  across  the  front  of  the  building,  and  one 
notices  the  marble  pillars,  slender  and  dark-green, 
and  black  lamps  with  vellum  shades.  Back  from 

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THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

this  room  extends  a  room  so  long  and  narrow  as  to 
be  almost  a  corridor,  and  when  dinners  are  served 
all  is  effective,  with  the  long  candle-lit  table,  the 
gowns,  the  faces,  in  the  softly  long  perspective. 
An  appreciation  of  the  beauty-loving  quality  in 
Chicagoans  comes  upon  one  very  strongly  in  a  place 
like  this.  When  there  is  a  play  given  by  members 
of  the  club,  it  is  likely  to  be  very  well  done;  and 
I  remember  an  excellent  presentation  of  "The  Im- 
portance of  being  Earnest."  Local  play-writing 
is  encouraged,  by  an  offer  to  give  production  to  any 
play  that  is  recommended  by  a  special  committee. 
The  club  is  a  club  that  is  different,  so  to  speak,  for 
its  object  is  to  bring  art  lovers  and  art  producers 
together,  for  mutual  benefit,  by  means  of  exhibi- 
tions, decorations  and  plays. 

There  is  so  great  an  amount  of  club  life  that  there 
is  a  marked  lack  of  knowledge  as  to  where  people 
live.  Men  meet  one  another  at  the  clubs  and  then 
vanish  from  one  another's  sight.  It  may  even  be 
the  case  that  intimate  friends  meet  at  the  club  of 
one  or  the  other  of  them,  to  the  practical  exclu- 
sion of  home  hospitalities;  and  the  men's  clubs 
with  dining  rooms  where  women  are  made  welcome, 
and  the  women's  clubs  where  men  may  dine,  add 
to  the  ease  of  keeping  up  family  friendships  away 
from  home. 

The  country  clubs  are,  as  with  other  great  cities, 
of  an  attractive  order,  such  as  the  Exmoor  and 
Glen  View,  with  golf  as  a  principal  feature;  and 
there  is  the  unique-looking  South  Shore,  palatial 

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CLUBS  ARE  TRUMPS 

albeit  of  stucco,  with  its  immensities  of  corridor 
space,  its  superbness  in  size  and  proportions  of  the 
interior.  In  contrast  to  this  is  another  club  to  the 
southward,  the  quiet,  friendly,  intimate  Quadrangle 
Club  at  the  University. 

But  one  always  comes  back  to  the  center  of 
things,  for  in  the  center  of  things  are  almost  all  of 
the  clubs. 

The  White  Paper  Club  meets  once  a  week  at  its 
meeting  room  in  one  of  the  central  hotels.  It  is  an 
interesting  club,  for  one  meets  newspaper  writers 
and  artists,  publishers  and  advertising  managers, 
live  men  of  live  ideas;  it  is  a  lunching  club,  and 
there  is  good  talk  with  the  luncheons.  And  if,  as 
at  other  clubs,  the  talk  is  sometimes  of  business, 
it  is  but  making  friendly  use  of  club  facilities.  The 
idea  that  a  club  is  a  drowsy  place,  where  business 
or  the  mere  thought  or  mention  of  business  is 
shocking,  is  not  at  all  consonant  with  Chicago  ideas. 
A  Chicago  club  is  a  convenient  place  to  talk  busi- 
ness as  well  as  a  place  for  social  gathering  and  con- 
verse, for  rest  and  recreation.  Now  and  then  some 
one  jibes,  at  some  club  or  another,  with  such 
phrases  as,  "You  meet  your  tailor  there  and  talk 
business,"  but  the  majority  of  clubmen  quite  ignore 
such  flings. 

The  Union  League  is  important,  and  its  member- 
ship id  largely  of  oldish  men  (oldish  for  Chicago!) 
men  of  business,  men  of  politics,  men  of  wealth. 
And  one  notices  that  the  name,  as  with  the  similarly 
named  organization  in  New  York,  is  the  "Union 

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League  Club,"  instead  of,  as  in  Philadelphia,  the 
1  'Union  League."  The  Chicago  Club  is  likewise 
a  club  with  a  considerable  proportion,  and  perhaps 
a  preponderance,  of  what  are  here  deemed  oldish 
men.  The  club  itself  is  more  than  half  a  century 
old,  and  its  members  are  largely  of  the  firmly  es- 
tablished in  wealth.  It  holds  itself  rather  high 
and  stiff — that  is,  stiff-  for  Chicago! — but  the 
members  smilingly  admit  that  at  the  time  of  organi- 
zation it  was  necessary  to  instruct  some  of  the  im- 
portant men  among  the  charter  members  as  to  the 
meaning  and  uses  of  a  club  and  club  membership. 
Among  its  members  have  been  such  men  of  national 
fame  as  Chief  Justice  Fuller,  Robert  T.  Lincoln 
and  General  Sheridan.  You  may  be  told,  also,  that 
the  first  president  of  the  club  was  one  McCagg,  and, 
with  a  fine  particularity  as  to  details,  your  club- 
member  informant  may  add  that  he  was  the  hus- 
band of  the  sister  of  the  first  mayor  of  the  city. 
There  used  to  be,  frankly,  a  " millionaire's  table," 
in  this  club;  but  the  frankness  of  the  early  days 
has  largely  gone:  there  could  readily  enough  be 
a  roomful  of  such  tables  now,  but  they  don't  call 
them  so. 

The  Chicago  Athletic  Association  may  stand  as 
a  type  of  strong  and  admirable  club,  with  its  great 
list  of  members,  including  a  wide  variety  of  classes, 
and  its  great  and  notable  building  looking  out  over 
the  Lake  Front;  a  roomy  capacious  building,  of  an 
architecture  of  which  its  members  are  immensely 

110 


CLUBS  ARE  TRUMPS 

proud,  and  with  a  fine  air  of  cheerful  restfulness 
and  an  atmosphere  of  comradeship. 

Equally  typical,  in  its  way,  is  a  tiny  little  club 
which  is  not  really  a  club  at  all  but  something  which 
holds  the  finest  essence  of  clubdom.  I  do  not  know 
anything  in  other  cities  precisely  to  compare  with 
it.  The  Little  Room,  it  is  called.  A  group  of  men 
and  women,  of  ideas  and  ideals,  gather  one  after- 
noon of  each  week  to  interchange  their  ideas  and 
judge  of  each  other's  ideals.  Artists  and  authors 
meet  there,  with  a  sprinkling  of  architects:  it  is 
a  closely  friendly  little  group,  meeting  in  the  studio 
of  Ralph  Clarkson.  It  is  so  without  pretense  or 
pretentiousness  that  it  can  take  with  a  smile  the 
appellation  of  the  " artistic  holy  of  holies,"  be- 
stowed upon  it  in  friendliness.  A  "  quaint  close 
corporation ' '  I  have  also  known  it  to  be  termed. 

The  Cliff  Dwellers  is  the  name  of  a  club  which 
might  be  called  the  Larger  Room,  for  it  is  much 
like  the  Little  Room  except  that  it  is  in  every  re- 
spect a  formal  club  and  that  its  membership  is  of 
men  only.  In  the  evening,  however,  and  for  dinner, 
women  are  guests.  Primarily  the  Cliff  Dwellers  is 
a  club  for  writers,  and  every  local  author  is  ex- 
pected to  be  a  member;  the  club  takes  its  name  be- 
cause its  rooms  look  out  over  the  lake,  from  the 
very  cornice  line  of  one  of  the  Lake  Front  build- 
ings. Artists  belong,  and  professional  and  business 
men  who  are  interested  in  artistic  and  literary  sub- 
jects. It  is  not  only  a  most  agreeable  club,  in  atmos- 

111 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

phere,  but  is  a  strong  influence  along  the  best  lines  of 
Chicago  development. 

The  Commercial  Club  is  an  organization  of  lead- 
ers in  Chicago  life  and  finance,  always  ready  to  aid 
when  an  object  especially  appeals. 

A  club  of  weight  and  character,  of  large  and  im- 
portant membership,  is  the  University  Club.  It 
occupies  its  own  building,  a  building  superb  in  size 
and  symmetry,  facing  out  toward  the  lake  from 
Michigan  Avenue ;  a  building  Gothic  throughout,  as- 
tonishing in  mastery  of  great  height.  It  is,  through- 
out, a  surprising  building  in  beauty  and  impressive- 
ness.  And  it  is  remarkable  that  in  such  a  city  of 
newness,  university  men  should  be  so  powerfully  in 
evidence. 

It  is  a  men's  club,  distinctively,  but  there  is  a 
women's  dining  room;  a  large,  low,  pleasant  room, 
of  leather  and  oak;  it  might  be  a  Cambridge  or  an 
Oxford  room,  perfect  as  it  is  in  soft,  rich,  dignified 
detail,  far  removed  from  gloss  and  glow,  filled  at 
luncheon  with  wives  and  daughters  and  guests;  a 
sort  of  happy,  easy,  protected  type,  far  removed 
from  the  tawdry  glories  of  a  "peacock  alley"  and 
not  to  be  seen  from  the  street  or  corridor. 

But  the  most  remarkable  feature  is  the  great 
high  main  dining-room,  splendid  in  its  Gothic  ef- 
fectiveness and  with  windows  glowing  with  stained- 
glass  color.  This,  you  will  be  told,  is  the  finest 
club  dining-room  in  the  world ;  and  you  are  inclined 
to  gasp;  and  then  you  begin  to  wonder  precisely 
which  one  you  could  place  ahead  of  it !  It  has  not, 

112 


CLUBS  ARE  TRUMPS 

indeed,  the  age  and  associations  of  some  of  the  old 
dining  halls,  but  Chicago  merely  feels,  in  the  face  of 
any  such  objection,  that  age  and  association  will 
come  with  time.  And  I  appreciate  the  sincerity 
of  a  member  who  gravely  said  to  me :  "When  I  eat 
my  dinner  here  I  feel  as  if  I  am  dining  in  West- 
minster Abbey!" 

And  this  reminds  me  that  somewhere  in  the  city 
there  is  a  Society  of  St.  George  of  Tanias!  And, 
as  if  not  to  be  outdone,  others  have  formed  a  Tribe 
of  Ben  Hur.  And  are  there  not  also  the  Royal 
Black  Knights  of  the  Camp  of  Israel! 


CHAPTER  IX 


THE   PASSING   OF   PRAIRIE  AVENUE 

EAIEIE        AVENUE, 

"the  sunny  street  that 
held  the  sifted  few,'* 
still  remains  in  the  mind  and 
memory  of  many  a  Chicagoan 
as  illustrative  of  all  that  is 
rich  and  splendid  in  city  life. 
Some  of  the  most  costly  of 
Chicago  homes  may  still  be 
seen  there,  and  some  of  the 
city's  most  delightful  peo- 
ple still  dwell  there,  but 
social  leadership,  on  the  whole,  has  gone  northward 
to  the  Gold  Coast.  With  the  departure  of  social 
leadership,  even  though  some  of  the  social  leaders 
still  have  their  homes  there,  the  passing  of  Prairie 
Avenue  began.  As  any  great  city  grows,  it  leaves 
behind  it  once  prosperous  sections;  and  as  this  is 
the  region  of  Prairie  and  Calumet  and  Indiana 
avenues  it  is  remindful,  through  these  names  as- 
sociated with  the  Indians,  of  the  custom  of  some  of 
the  tribes,  when  on  the  march,  to  leave  behind  to 
perish  such  as  could  not  keep  up  with  the  necessary 
swiftness  of  the  pace. 

114 


THE  PASSING  OF  PRAIRIE  AVENUE 

An  example  of  the  changes  that  have  come  is 
given  by  the  First  Presbyterian  Church.  It  was 
prominent  among  the  churches  of  this  section  and 
was  just  one  block  from  Prairie  Avenue.  It  took 
pride  in  having  the  tallest  steeple  in  Chicago  and 
in  having  a  congregation  of  importance;  but  the 
church  spire  has  vanished  and  the  building  stands 
bleak  and  bare  and  dreary,  and  the  congregation 
has  deserted  the  old  building  and  has  gathered  in  a 
new  one  elsewhere. 

I  think  it  was  Dean  Hole,  that  merry  old  soul, 
who  first  put  a  Prairie  Avenue  story  in  print,  after 
it  had  passed  for  quite  a  while  in  Chicago  circles 
by  word  of  mouth.  One  of  the  very  rich  men  of 
this  very  rich  quarter,  a  man  sour  and  dour,  who 
had  the  reputation  of  being  grasping,  fell  sick,  and 
the  doctor  ordered  that  he  walk  every  morning  to 
his  place  of  business.  The  first  morning,  he  looked 
so  unwontedly  happy  that  his  business  partner 
asked  him  what  had  occurred.  "I  have  done  three 
splendid  acts,"  the  man  replied.  And  he  went  on 
to  say  that  as  he  walked  down  to  business  he  saw  a 
woman  with  a  child  in  her  arms  weeping  on  the 
steps  of  a  church.  He  stopped  and  asked  her  what 
was  the  matter  and  was  told  that  she  wanted  to 
have  her  child  baptized,  but  that  a  dollar  was  de- 
manded and  she  did  not  have  it.  Whereupon,  "I 
have  only  a  ten  dollar  bill.  Take  it.  Go  in,  get  the 
child  baptized,  and  bring  me  the  change.  And  so" 
— this  with  immensely  satisfied  triumph — "And  so, 
I  made  a  woman  happy ;  and  placed  her  child  upon 

115 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

the  heavenly  road;  and  I  got  rid  of  a  counterfeit 
ten  dollar  bill  and  have  nine  good  dollars  in  my 
pocket ! ' ' 

Dean  Hole  also  quotes  with  joy  some  statements 
made  in  a  speech  of  welcome  at  a  dinner  in  his 
honor  by  one  who  seems  to  have  been  of  Prairie 
Avenue:  " Chicago  is  the  largest  city  in  America, 
has  more  miles  of  railroad,  more  vessel  tonnage, 
more  freight,  larger  parks,  dirtier  streets,  a  sootier 
atmosphere,  a  more  malodorous  river,  more 
gamblers,  more  good  things,  more  bad  things,  than 
any  other  city."  That  was  some  years  ago,  while 
Prairie  Avenue  still  possessed  more  of  the  im- 
portant spokesmen  for  the  city,  but,  to  add  to  the 
joy  of  superlatives,  I  have  before  me  a  statement 
made  in  print  this  present  year:  "A  casual  in- 
vestigation shows  that  Chicago  is  America's  prin- 
cipal piano  market,  its  chief  mail-order  center,  its 
leading  stove  market.  The  city  has  the  busiest 
street  corner  in  the  world,  the  most  traveled  bridge 
in  existence,  the  largest  department  store  on  the 
map,  the  largest  art  school  on  the  globe."  And  all 
these  from  a  mere  ''casual  investigation!" 

The  Prairie  Avenue  district  is  narrowly  hemmed 
in  by  the  railway  tracks  and  lake  on  the  east,  and 
the  encroaching  business  district  on  the  west,  mak- 
ing it  impossible  to  expand  or  even  to  hold  its  own. 
From  the  northward,  what  may  be  called  a  sort  of 
debris  of  business  has  been  swept  ahead  of  the 
Grant  Park  and  Lake  Front  improvements,  and 
only  a  few  blocks  to  the  southward  is  a  region 

116 


THE  PASSING  OF  PRAIRIE  AVENUE 

which,  as  Chicagoans  themselves  love  to  put  it,  is 
the  " greatest  negro  settlement  outside  of  Africa!" 

In  this  encroaching  district  immediately  to  the 
westward  there  stands  what  one  is  tempted  to  term 
the  ugliest  building  in  Chicago,  a  huge  building, 
hugely  barrel  roofed,  with  pseudo-mediaeval  battle- 
ments and  towers.  One  day,  in  Rome,  I  was  told  of 
a  Chicago  woman  visitor  who  asked  if  it  were  really 
true  that  the  Pope  never  went  outside  of  the 
Coliseum;  adding,  that  they  had  a  Coliseum  them- 
selves, at  home,  in  Chicago.  And  this  is  the 
Coliseum. 

They  hold  great  meetings  there,  the  place  at  least 
being  a  convenience  from  its  size,  and  now  and 
then  one  sees  upon  it  the  sign  of  "Greatest  Show 
on  Earth" — which,  oddest  of  all  odd  facts,  is  not, 
even  with  such  a  description,  a  Chicago  show! — 
and  it  is  a  place  for  great  conventions.  And  they 
tell  you  (those  who  boast  of  the  "greatest  settle- 
ment outside  of  Africa")  that  a  darky,  dressed 
with  an  elaborateness  such  as  only  a  darky  dandy 
can  achieve,  was  walking  past  this  huge  building 
of  ugliness  from  his  nearby  home  when  he  was 
espied  and  accosted  by  a  white  delegate  who 
thought  him  possible  political  prey.  "Are  you  a 
delegate?"  To  which  came  the  answer,  coldly  dis- 
dainful: "No,  sah!  No,  sah!  It's  bad  enough 
bein'  a  niggah  without  bein'  a  delegate!" 

Hemmed  in  on  all  sides,  actually  and  potentially, 
from  the  first,  it  is  astonishing  that  men  of  astute 
business  minds  should  have  built  in  the  Prairie 

117 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

Avenue  district.  And,  indeed,  there  never  were 
enough  great  houses  in  number,  to  explain  the  pre- 
dominance of  the  neighborhood  for  years.  The  ex- 
planation lay  in  the  character  of  the  individuals. 
The  houses  built  by  the  wealthiest  among  them  were 
not  models  of  grace  or  beauty  or  dignity;  they 
were  put  up  in  an  era  designated,  from  the  name 
of  the  long  regnant  British  Queen,  as  Victorian, 
although  it  might  have  been  fairer  and  assuredly 
would  have  been  more  chivalrous  to  term  them  as  of 
the  period  of  Hayes  or  Arthur,  or  Benjamin  Har- 
rison. But  whether  named  from  Queen  or  Presi- 
dents it  was  an  era  in  which  the  wealthy  reveled 
in  the  heavily  and  solidly  and  expensively  in- 
artistic, with  somewhat  of  a  popular  towered  effect. 
In  most  of  these  bizarre  houses  of  heavily  heaped 
wealth,  bizarre  things  were  done,  seeking  bizarre 
effects;  for  example,  as  I  remember  noticing  in  the 
memoirs  of  a  Boston  woman  who  visited  here 
shortly  before  the  Great  Fire,  the  serving  of  ices, 
at  a  luncheon  in  one  of  these  great  houses,  was  on 
actual  calla  lilies,  each  lily  resting  on  its  own  leaf 
on  the  plate:  "All  in  good  taste,"  wrote  the 
Boston  visitor,  so  perhaps  one  is  over  critical  in 
thinking  that  it  was  not  a  nice  way  to  treat  calla 
lilies. 

Most  of  the  great  homes  of  this  region  that  are 
still  kept  up  as  homes  are  closed  and  dreary  during 
a  great  part  of  each  year,  the  owners  using  them 
as  city  houses  only,  and  living  a  more  charming 
existence  in  some  residential  suburb,  such  as  Lake 

118 


THE  PASSING  OF  PRAIRIE  AVENUE 

Forest,  or,  still  farther,  perhaps  drawn  by  the 
beauties  of  Lake  Geneva. 

Business  has  not  only  pressed  close  against  the 
borders  of  the  Prairie  Avenue  region  but  has 
actually  begun  to  scatter  through  the  district;  and 
it  seems  odd  to  notice  a  once  while  residence  turned 
into  a  factory  for  hairpins.  Another  house,  made 
over  for  business  offices,  bears  the  saddening  sign 
that  it  is  for  rent  for  " school  or  offices"  or,  last 
blow  of  all,  "sanitarium." 

But  another  and  different  business,  as  to  outward 
aspect,  with  fine  architectural  effects,  has  also  in- 
vaded the  so  recently  socially  sacred  quarter.  A 
big  printing  house  has  put  up  a  building  there,  with 
a  charming  entablatured  line,  on  the  exterior  of  the 
building,  of  open  books,  in  terra  cotta :  and  the  en- 
tire building  is  unobtrusively  excellent  in  its  effect. 
Another  business  structure  has  a  fine  stone  balcony ; 
and  there  is  a  business  building  with  an  attractive 
line  of  armorial  bearings. 

When  one  notices  the  huge  stones  slanting  down 
over  the  deep  gutter  crossings,  one  of  the  evidences 
of  care  for  pedestrians  in  the  already  distant  days, 
the  feeling  comes  that  the  district  might  be  worthy 
of  a  better  fate  than  gradual  desertion.  And  the 
thought  of  pedestrians  brings  thoughts  of  trolley 
cars,  these  being  the  two  acknowledged  methods  of 
getting  about,  for  the  hoi  polloi,  up  to  recent  years ; 
and  this  comes  from  the  memory  of  a  novel  by  a 
Chicago  novelist,  Robert  Herrick  (who  was  once 
highly  praised  for  some  verses  written  by  the 

119 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

Robert  Herrick  of  long  ago,  who  died  five  years  be- 
fore La  Salle  first  reached  the  site  of  Chicago).  In 
the  novel  by  the  Chicago  Robert  Herrick,  the 
daughter  of  one  of  the  Prairie  Avenue  palaces  finds 
that  her  motor-car  and  chauffeur  have  vanished, 
and  she  is  thereby  quite  helpless,  having  no  idea 
how  to  get  home;  she  thinks  vaguely  of  taking  a 
trolley-car,  knowing,  in  a  way,  that  people  actually 
ride  in  trolley-cars  and  presumably  reach  certain 
destinations;  but  would  not  risk  the  experiment, 
never  having  been  on  a  trolley-car  in  her  life! — • 
a  supposed  situation  which  seems  somewhat  gro- 
tesque, for  the  distance  is  not  great  and  a  Chicago 
girl  would  surely  have  been  sensible  enough  to 
walk. 

She  lived  in  a  ''formidable  pile  of  red  brick" 
near  Eighteenth  Street;  and  that  street  is  memor- 
able as  the  scene  of  the  long-ago  Chicago  Massacre. 
For  at  what  is  now  Eighteenth  Street  and  Calumet 
Avenue  the  massacre  centered ;  and  one  pictures  the 
doomed  party  making  their  slow  way  along  while 
the  Indians,  from  what  we  may  term,  on  account  of 
what  was  afterwards  built  there,  their  department 
store  camp,  gathered  and  watched  and  followed; 
and  here  they  did  their  killing.  There  were  no 
houses  along  the  lake  then,  southward  from  the 
fort  near  the  mouth  of  the  river;  there  were  no 
streets  and  no  store;  but  one  imagines  the  tragedy, 
at  times,  as  if  the  party  came  up  the  brilliant  Lake 
Front  to  be  killed  at  Prairie  Avenue.  Calumet 
Avenue  and  Prairie  Avenue  adjoin  and  parallel 

120 


THE  PASSING  OF  PRAIRIE  AVENUE 

each  other,  and  the  killing  raged  around  where  both 
these  thoroughfares  were  to  be.  In  those  early 
days,  along  the  lake  there  was  but  an  ancient  Indian 
trail  used  by  dusky  tribesmen  for  long  genera- 
tions. 

Never  was  a  movement  more  definitely  arranged, 
in  every  detail,  for  disaster.  It  was  in  August  of 
1812.  War  had  broken  out  with  England.  The 
Indian  allies  of  the  English  were  hovering  hungrily. 
The  commander  of  the  Fort,  Captain  Heald,  de- 
cided to  attempt  to  make  the  overland  journey  to 
Fort  Wayne,  the  nearest  place  of  refuge.  He  called 
the  Indians  together  and  told  them  of  his  plans! 
He  promised  them  all  the  supplies  and  muskets  and 
whiskey  that  his  party  could  not  carry,  and  the 
Indians  met  his  declaration  with  ejaculations  of  joy. 
After  that,  he  took  several  days  to  complete  his 
preparations,  and,  upon  Kinzie's  warning  him  of 
the  danger  of  handing  over  whiskey  and  firearms, 
he  broke  open  what  whiskey  barrels  remained  and 
let  the  whiskey  run  out,  and  broke  up  the  muskets ; 
all  of  which  naturally  angered  the  Indians. 

Heald  might  have  remained  and  defended  the 
fort.  General  Hull,  his  superior,  sent  orders  from 
Detroit  to  evacuate  the  post,  but  Heald  might  have 
exercised  the  right  to  act  on  his  own  judgment,  he 
having  full  knowledge  of  the  situation  and  General 
Hull  not  being  in  touch  with  it.  Or  he  might,  had 
he  been  a  swiftly  resolute  man,  have  marched  away 
without  any  delay,  his  only  possible  chance  of  mak- 
ing a  safe  retreat.  But  to  wait  for  several  days, 

121 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

and  to  let  the  Indians  know  all  his  plans,  and  to 
anger  them  needlessly  by  disappointment — the 
whole  thing  was  such  a  series  of  blunders  as  could 
scarcely  fall  to  the  lot  of  one  man  to  make.  But 
Heald  did  not  miss  a  single  blunder. 

He  seems  to  have  had  something  fewer  than  a 
hundred  to  care  for,  including  officers  and  soldiers 
and  a  number  of  wives  and  children.  A  brave 
young  American  officer,  romantically  chivalrous  and 
well  acquainted  with  Indians  and  their  ways,  Cap- 
tain Wells,  unexpectedly  appeared,  having  made 
his  way  through  the  wilderness,  from  Fort  Wayne, 
starting  the  moment  he  heard  of  the  garrison's 
danger  and  hoping  to  be  of  help  in  defending  the 
fort.  He  brought  with  him  fifteen  Indians,  friendly 
to  the  Americans.  Wells  was  bitterly  and  passion- 
ately angered  when  he  learned  that  Heald  was 
going  to  march  them  all  out  to  what  seemed  certain 
death. 

On  August  the  fifteenth  the  party  left  the  fort.  It 
was  a  pathetic  and  desperate  sight.  Wells  had 
painted  his  face  black  in  Indian  fashion,  in  token 
of  certain  death,  and  a  few  musicians  brokenly 
played  the  Dead  March.  There  were  a  few  rough 
wagons;  a  few  rode  on  horseback;  most  went  on 
foot. 

Kinzie,  too,  had  to  leave  his  home,  and  he  put  his 
family  in  his  boat,  to  cross  the  lake,  while  he  him- 
self disinterestedly  accompanied  the  soldiers,  hop- 
ing to  be  able  to  aid  them  through  his  own  influence 
with  the  Indians. 

122 


THE  PASSING  OF  PEAIRIE  AVENUE 

The  tragic  notes  of  the  Dead  March,  the  sobs  of 
the  children,  the  frightened  silence  of  the  women, 
the  curses  of  the  men,  the  already  frightened  brag- 
gadocio of  Heald,  the  blackened  face  of  Wells — the 
Indians  spreading  along  abreast  of  the  thin  line 
and  silent  except  for  now  and  then  a  signal  whoop 
— thus,  holding  to  the  trail  close  to  the  side  of  the 
lake,  the  refugees  went  on.  One  shivers  at  the 
imagination  of  the  agony  drawn  out  for  two  miles, 
with  every  moment  the  expectation  of  attack,  and 
with  the  Indians  flitting  along  like  shadows. 

After  holding  off  for  two  miles,  playing  with  the 
fugitives  like  cats  with  particularly  helpless  mice, 
the  Indians  swarmed  to  the  attack.  Even  now  mili- 
tary skill  could  have  done  something.  Defense 
could  have  been  made.  The  party  could  have 
fought  its  way  back  to  the  fort.  But  there  was 
nothing  of  military  skill  in  Heald.  He  was  as  in- 
capable as  was  General  Hull  himself.  There  was 
random  fighting,  there  was  desperate  individual 
heroism,  there  was  the  killing  of  women  and  chil- 
dren and  the  killing  and  torturing  and  scalping  of 
prisoners;  the  usual  and  expected  details  of  Indian 
fighting.  The  whites  lost  some  fifty  in  all.  Some 
forty  men  and  a  few  women  were  permitted  to  sur- 
render and  their  lives  were  spared  owing  mainly  to 
the  influence  of  Kinzie.  Poor  Wells  was  killed, 
after  displaying  desperate  bravery  and  killing  at 
least  eight :  and  the  savages  devoured  his  heart  that 
they  might  thus  acquire  a  share  of  his  courage:  a 
compliment  which  he,  more  keenly  than  most  men, 

123 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

would  have  appreciated  had  he  been  in  a  position 
where  appreciation  was  possible.  Heald,  one  finds, 
was  among  the  saved;  and  his  wife  was  saved 
through  her  readiness  in  presenting  to  the  Indian 
who  seized  her  the  mule  upon  which  she  was  riding 
— he  not  stopping  to  realize  that  her  title  to  it  had 
become  suddenly  very  faint,  and  owing  also  to  her 
promise  that  at  some  later  day  she  would  get  for 
him  a  dozen  bottles  of  whiskey.  When  the  step- 
daughter of  Kinzie,  wife  of  Lieutenant  Helm,  the 
second  in  command,  was  on  the  point  of  being  toma- 
hawked, when  indeed  she  had  received  one  stroke  of 
the  blade  and  was  about  to  receive  another,  another 
Indian  rushed  in  and,  grasping  her  from  the  Indian 
about  to  kill  her,  dragged  her  toward  the  lake,  close 
at  hand,  crying  out  that  he  would  drown  her;  when 
in  reality  it  was  a  feint  to  save  her. 

The  Indians  did  not  harm  Kinzie.  It  was  with 
reluctance  that  they  even  led  him  off  as  a  prisoner. 
He  was  not  long  held  captive,  but  he  did  not  see 
Chicago  again  for  some  years  and  the  fort  was 
meantime  burned  by  the  Indians  and  the  locality 
was  for  a  time  a  place  of  desolation. 

So  the  F.  F.  C.'s — it  was  too  late  to  include  them 
among  F.  F.  V.'s,  the  Virginia  government  of  Chi- 
cago having  ended — the  F.  F.  C.rs  went  a  dreadful 
journey  to  a  tragedy.  And  there  a  monument  has 
been  put  up,  at  the  lake-side  end  of  Eighteenth 
Street,  close  behind  the  great  Pullman  mansion  and 
facing  out  toward  Prairie  and  Calumet  Avenues. 
It  is  a  spirited  and  excellent  monument,  a  bronze 

124 


THE  PASSING  OF  PRAIRIE  AVENUE 

grouping  of  figures  on  a  lowish  granite  base.  It 
is  an  odd  feature,  that  this  monument  to  the  memory 
of  a  massacre  actually  perpetuates  the  saving  of  life 
instead  of  the  taking  of  it,  for  it  represents  the 
rescuing  of  the  wife  of  Helm,  by  Black  Partridge, 
from  the  hands  of  the  Indian  who  was  about  to  kill 
her. 

Upon  the  sides  of  the  granite  base  are  bronze  bas- 
reliefs  representing  scenes  connected  with  the 
massacre,  and  especially  notable  is  that  which  shows 
the  soldiers  and  civilians,  in  a  long  line,  on  foot,  on 
horseback  or  in  wagons,  setting  forth  on  their  march 
to  death ;  a  grimly  effective  bit. 

The  soot  from  the  near-at-hand  railway  seemp 
thicker  and  blacker  here  than  elsewhere  even  in  the 
Prairie  Avenue  district,  and  thick  lying  cinders  from 
the  railway  engines  crunch  beneath  the  feet  as  one 
walks  around  the  monument. 

With  the  great  houses  shuttered  and  deserted  in 
winter-time,  and  with  front  steps  and  driveways 
thick  with  untrodden  snow,  much  of  the  region  then 
wears  a  desolate  aspect.  And  I  remember  an  odd 
and  characteristic  sight,  a  long  double  line,  on  an 
alley,  of  silent  and  unused-coach  houses,  out  of 
which  the  barouches  of  the  eighties  used  statelily  to 
roll. 

And  as  I  noticed  one  closed  house,  of  unusually 
pathetic  dreariness,  there  came  to  me  a  verse  by 
one  of  the  Chicago  poets  (it  was  Grace  Boylan, 
one  of  those  who  find  inspiration  in  their  own  en- 
vironment) : 

125 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

"Cold  and  cheerless,  bare  and  bleak, 
The  old  house  fronts  the  shabby  street; 
And  the  dull  windows  eastward  gaze, 
As  their  cobwebbed  brows  they  raise. ' ' 

And  another  of  the  houses,  as  I  passed  by  one 
evening,  made  me  think  of  some  lines  of  another 
Chicago  poet,  Bodenheim: 

' '  The  ghost  of  a  purple-roofed  house 
That  ever  held  repose. ' ' 

It  was  a  few  blocks  to  the  southward  of  the  dis- 
trict, that  there  stood  the  home  of  that  Stephen  A. 
Douglas  who  made  so  great  a  figure  in  Chicago  and 
in  the  nation.  And  in  tiny  Douglas  Monument 
Park,  at  the  lake  shore  end  of  Thirty-fifth  Street, 
is  his  monument.  His  marble  sarcophagus  is  in 
view,  within  the  crypt,  and  deeply  engraved  are  the 
words  which,  good  American  that  he  was,  he  left 
as  his  final  and  solemn  admonition:  ''Tell  my 
children  to  obey  the  laws  and  uphold  the  Constitu- 
tion." A  round  granite  tower  rises  above  the 
crypt,  and  aloft,  on  its  top,  stands  Douglas  in 
bronze.  " Preparing  to  dive  into  the  Lake,"  wrote 
a  cynical  Boston  visitor;  but  in  reality  looking,  in 
bronze,  up  on  top  of  the  granite,  so  old-time  Chi- 
cagoans  will  tell  you,  precisely  as  he  looked  in  life : 
and  they  will  tell  you  that,  though  of  bronze  and 
granite  character,  the  '* little  giant"  was  a  lovable 
and  likable  man. 

To  have  the  President  of  the  United  States,  An- 
drew Johnson,  lay  the  corner-stone  of  the  Douglas 

126 


THE  PASSING  OF  PRAIRIE  AVENUE 

monument  was  the  occasion  of  one  of  the  most 
curious  episodes  in  American  political  history;  for 
Johnson's  trip  to  Chicago  for  the  unveiling  de- 
veloped into  the  famous  "  swinging  around  the 
circle"  in  the  course  of  which  there  were  so  many 
exciting  scenes  and  so  many  unwise  statements. 
Petroleum  V.  Nasby,  with  his  genial  backhanded- 
ness  of  humor,  declared  the  tour  to  have  been  under- 
taken "to  arouse  the  people  to  the  danger  of  con- 
centrating power  in  the  hands  of  Congress  instead 
of  diffusing  it  through  one  man. ' ' 

Beaten  by  Lincoln  for  the  Presidency,  Douglas 
held  the  hat  of  his  successful  rival,  that  funny  huge- 
ness of  headgear,  during  the  Inaugural  address; 
and  went  to  his  home  city  to  die.  But  he  did  not 
die  in  his  own  house :  more  fittingly,  under  the  cir- 
cumstances, like  a  soldier  meeting  his  end  on  the 
battlefield,  he  died  at  the  old  Tremont  House,  so 
closely  associated  with  the  political  fortunes  of  both 
Lincoln  and  Douglas,  and  the  scene  of  numberless 
political  meetings  and  consultations  and  contests  and 
speeches.  From  the  balcony  of  that  old  Tremont 
House  (it  stood  at  Dearborn  and  Lake  Streets) 
Douglas  delivered  to  a  huge  crowd  the  first  of  his 
mighty  speeches  in  rivalry  with  Lincoln,  and  from 
the  same  balcony  Lincoln  made  a  still  more  mighty 
reply:  not  of  the  formal  Lincoln-Douglas  debates, 
these,  but  immediately  before  that  astonishing 
series  commenced. 

As  the  Convention  which  nominated  Lincoln  be- 
gan its  sessions,  the  Illinois  delegation  met  at  the 

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THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

Tremont  House  and  discussed  among  other  things 
the  tactics  of  the  Seward  men,  who  had  organized 
a  system  of  tremendous  cheering  at  every  mention 
of  Seward 's  name.  One  of  the  Illinois  delegates 
told  of  a  man  whose  voice  could  be  heard  against  a 
storm  on  Lake  Michigan,  or,  on  a  calm  day,  it  was 
claimed  he  could  be  heard  across  the  lake.  Another 
knew  where,  on  the  Illinois  River,  lived  a  Doctor 
Ames,  said  to  be  unequaled  as  a  shouter.  Ames 
was  telegraphed  for,  to  come  on  the  first  train.  The 
Chicago  man  was  also  secured.  And  at  the  head  of 
parties  of  shouters  on  either  side  of  the  Wigwam, 
these  two  shouted  and  roared  at  every  mention  of 
Lincoln  or  whenever  a  Lincoln  leader  motioned  with 
his  handkerchief.  Never  was  there  such  shouting! 
Seward 's  men,  mere  mild  New  Yorkers,  were  out- 
classed into  insignificance.  And  Lincoln  was  nomi- 
nated amid  a  terrific  uproar  of  voices. 

In  1856  Lincoln  wrote  of  Douglas :  ' '  Twenty  years 
ago  Douglas  and  I  first  became  acquainted.  We 
were  both  young  then — he  a  trifle  younger  than  I. 
Even  then  we  were  both  ambitious — I,  perhaps, 
quite  as  much  as  he.  With  me  the  race  of  ambition 
had  been  a  failure — a  flat  failure.  With  him  it  had 
been  one  of  splendid  success."  And  it  was  in  that 
year  that  Douglas4  farsightedly  gave  ten  acres^  of 
land,  at  Thirty-fourth  Street  and  Cottage  Grove 
Avenue,  for  the  beginning  of  a  "University  of  Chi- 
cago. He  was  one  of  the  incorporators,  was  one 
of  the  trustees  till  the  time  of  his  death,  and  for  at 
least  part  of  the  time  president  of  the  board.  It 

128 


THE  PASSING  OF  PRAIRIE  AVENUE 

did  not  succeed,  as  it  would  have  done  had  Douglas 
lived.  In  the  course  of  its  years  of  financially 
troubled  existence  it  won  honor  and  friends,  and  in 
manly  fashion  it  passed  over  its  title,  the  University 
of  Chicago,  to  the  institution  founded  by  Rocke- 
feller, and  the  new  university  courteously  adopted 
the  alumni  of  the  old  as  her  own,  reenacted  the  de- 
grees of  the  old  university,  and  placed  a  bronze 
bust  of  Douglas  in  one  of  the  new  university  build- 
ings. But  it  did  not  establish  itself,  in  accordance 
with  the  ideas  of  Douglas,  immediately  to  the  south- 
ward of  the  Prairie  Avenue  district. 

The  well-known  men  connected  with  the  limited 
area  of  the  Prairie  Avenue  region,  the  owners  of 
the  old  homes  there,  won  honor  from  this  "city 
whose  merchants  are  princes,"  to  use  the  fine  old 
phrase  of  old  Isaiah,  when  writing  of  Tyre,  a  Chi- 
cago of  the  distant  past.  And  he  goes  on  to  say 
that  the  city's  " merchandise  shall  be  for  them  that 
dwell  before  the  Lord,  to  eat  sufficiently,  and  for 
durable  clothing" — to  have  sufficient  food,  and  dur- 
able clothing  (what  a  supposedly  modern  phrase 
put  in  by  the  Elizabethan  translators!)  and  to  be 
religious,  were  thus  his  ideals  for  a  city ;  and,  some- 
what incongruously,  there  comes  to  mind  the  story 
of  the  minister  who,  living  on  one  of  the  streets  that 
cross  Prairie  Avenue,  was  called  upon  one  evening 
to  perform  a  marriage  ceremony  at  his  home,  for  a 
young  couple,  strangers  to  him:  after  which  the 
new-made  Benedick  somewhat  nervously  took  the 
clergyman  aside  and  said:  "I'm  sorry  that  I 

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THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

haven't  any  money;  but  if  you'll  lead  me  to  your 
cellar  I'll  show  you  how  to  make  your  electric  meter 
stop  registering"! 

When  I  think  of  this  district  of  Prairie  Avenue 
there  oome  not  only  thoughts  of  tragic  history  and 
of  "merchant  princes,"  again  to  quote  Isaiah,  and 
of  slow-vanishing  glory,  but  also  the  memory  of  a 
huge  apparent  water  tank,  standing  on  a  low  flat 
roof  near  the  Massacre  Monument  and  seen  from 
the  railway,  and  bearing,  when  I  saw  it,  the  one 
word,  mysterious-seeming  under  the  circumstances, 
with  nothing  accompanying  or  explaining,  "Milk." 


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CHAPTER  X 


SOME  BOOKS   AND   WEITEES 

IPLING  frankly  railed 
at  Chicago.  Every- 
thing there  was  un-* 
pleasant  or  bad.  He 
wandered  "through 
scores  of  miles  of 
these  terrible  streets,  jostling 
some  few  hundred  thousand 
of  these  terrible  people." 
And  he  was  worried  because 
of  the  city's  flatness.  But 
Chicago  took  his  criticisms 
with  philosophic  tolerance.  "The  truth  seems  to 
be  that  Mr.  Kipling  is  an  unusually  bright  fellow 
who  enjoys  a  somewhat  exaggerated  opinion  of  his 
own  brightness,"  as  a  newspaper  expressed  it;  and 
then  came  one  single  crushing  caustic  retort  to  his 
unbridled  comments:  "Is  it  possible  that  Kipling, 
now  twenty-four  years  of  age,  is  at  his  perihelion, 
physically  and  intellectually?"  And  that  cut  Kip- 
ling deep. 

It  needed  the  clear-sighted  West  to  discern  or 
divine,  what  was  not  to  be  visible  to  the  rest  of  the 
world  for  years,  that  Kipling,  at  the  time  he  was 

131 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

writing  of  Chicago,  had  already  begun  to  show 
signs  of  a  fall  from  a  marvelous  rise ;  at  that  time,  or 
within  a  year  or  two  afterwards,  he  had  done  prac- 
tically all  the  writing  for  which  he  is  to-day  held 
famous. 

But  there  were  noble  possibilities  of  apprecia- 
tion, even  for  things  American,  in  this  young  man 
of  remarkable  powers,  seeing  this  country  on  his 
way  to  England  from  India,  the  land  of  his  birth. 
For,  a  few  days  after  leaving  Chicago  and  going 
eastward,  he  called  upon  Mark  Twain;  he  had,  as 
he  wrote,  learned  to  love  and  admire  Mark  Twain 
fourteen  thousand  miles  away ;  and,  as  the  two  talk 
together,  Mark  rests  his  hand  for  a  moment  on 
Kipling's  shoulder,  and  the  young  man  is  thrilled 
and  humble.  To  him,  as  he  expresses  it,  it  is  equal 
to  being  decorated  with  the  Star  of  India,  with  blue 
silk,  trumpets,  and  diamond-studded  jewel,  all  com- 
plete; and  then  come  creepy  words,  terrible  words, 
showing  that  the  calm  query  of  Chicago  had  found 
an  echo  within  his  own  consciousness:  "If,  here- 
after, in  the  changes  and  chances  of  this  mortal 
life,  I  fall  to  cureless  ruin,  I  will  tell  the  superin- 
tendent of  the  workhouse  that  Mark  Twain  once  put 
his  hand  on  my  shoulder;  and  he  shall  give  me  a 
room  to  myself  and  a  double  allowance  of  pauper's 
tobacco." 

But  while  in  the  Lake  Michigan  city  he  spent  his 
time  in  seeking  new  splenetic  phrases.  "They  have 
managed  to  get  a  million  of  men  together  on  flat 
land,  and  the  bulk  of  these  men  appear  to  be  lower 

132 


SOME  BOOKS  AND  WRITERS 

than  Mahajans.  The  city  is  inhabited  by  savages. ' ' 
And  how  little  Kipling  could  possibly  have 
imagined  that  he  was  to  become  connected  with 
Chicago  by  marriage!  John  Kinzie,  the  trader, 
had  a  son,  also  named  John,  who  as  a  boy  of  nine 
years  witnessed  the  Indian  massacre  from  a  little 
boat  out  in  the  lake,  in  which,  with  his  mother,  he 
had  been  placed  for  safety.  He  grew  up  a  Chi- 
cagoan,  and  married  a  Connecticut  girl  of  unusual 
qualities,  a  girl  of  family  even  according  to  the 
strictest  code  of  social  Pharisees,  for  she  was  a  de- 
scendant of  the  great  Governor  Roger  Wolcott. 
She  had  been  given  a  fine  education,  and  was  pro- 
ficient in  Latin  and  German  and  French;  and  to 
know  of  such  people  in  early  days  in  Chicago  is  to 
understand  somewhat  of  the  reasons  for  the  city's 
intellectual  advance.  The  wife  of  Kinzie  really 
ranks  first  amon^  authors  of  the  city,  too,  through 
her  "Wau-Bun,"  a  book  of  charm,  still  read  and 
readable,  concerning  the  early  days  of  her  city. 
(To  be  literally  exact,  it  should  be  said  that  the 
first  complete  writing,  here,  long  antedated  Wau- 
Bun,  it  being  the  Portage  de  Checagou  letter  of  La 
Salle;  and  that,  a  little  earlier,  Marquette  wrote 
part  of  his  Journal  here.) 

The  author  of  "Wau-Bun"  and  her  husband  lost 
their  own  son,  and  they  grieved  bitterly,  but  strove 
to  fill  the  place  by  adopting,  from  time  to  time,  sev- 
eral nieces  and  cousins.  One  of  these  adopted 
children  became  Mrs.  Joseph  Balestier,  and  it  was 
her  granddaughter  who  became  the  wife  of  Rudyard 

133 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

Kipling.  After  which,  so  far  as  I  have  ever  heard, 
he  no  longer  criticized  Chicago. 

This  city  has  had  a  goodly  number  of  unusually 
good  writers.  But  some  go  and  settle  in  the  East, 
after  which  Chicago  forgets  them,  as  does  the  world 
in  general. 

It  looked  for  a  while  as  if  Hamlin  Garland  would 
be  a  Chicagoan.  He  was  born  in  Wisconsin,  and  it 
seemed  to  him  that  this  city  was  to  be  his  destined 
literary  home.  He  went  East,  however,  instead; 
but  after  some  years  decided  to  obey  the  Chicago 
impulse  and  return.  And  the  city  offered  him  a 
cordial  welcome.  "We  have  for  Mr.  Garland  the 
warmest  affection, "  wrote  Eugene  Field:  "We 
admire  his  work,  too,  very,  very  much.  Garland  is 
young  and  impressionable;  in  an  evil  hour  he  fell 
under  the  baleful  influence  of  William  D.  Howells, 
and — there  you  are.  If  we  could  contrive  to  keep 
Garland  away  from  Howells  long  enough  we  'd  make 
a  big  man  of  him,  for  there  is  a  heap  of  good  stuff 
in  him.  In  all  solemnity  we  declare  it  to  be  our 
opinion  that  Howells  is  the  only  bad  habit  Garland 
has/'  But  Garland,  although  returning  to  this 
city,  did  not  stay  long  after  all,  but  went  back  to 
New  York ;  with  the  usual  result. 

Eugene  Field  was  the  Oliver  Wendell  Holmes  of 
Chicago.  "A  fellow  of  infinite  jest,  of  most  ex- 
cellent fancy."  Author  of  the  city's  classic,  "Little 
Boy  Blue,"  he  was  equally  at  home  in  verse  or 
prose.  But,  though  so  much  like  Holmes,  Field,  be- 
side the  Lake  Front,  could  never  have  fallen  into 

134 


LIBRARY 

OF  THE 

UNIVERSITY  OF  ILLINOIS 


SOME  BOOKS  AND  WRITERS 

the  habit  of  Holmes,  beside  his  Back  Bay,  of  sitting 
down  and  writing  a  poem,  before  going  to  bed,  upon 
some  lecture  to  which  he  had  that  evening  listened ! 

In  cleverness,  in  whimsicalness,  in  insight  into 
humanity  and  character,  in  geniality,  in  real  feel- 
ing, in  wit  and  humor,  in  pungency,  in  camaraderie, 
in  bonhomie,  in  marvelous  facility,  in  genuine 
Americanism,  the  two  were  much  alike.  And  here 
is  an  astonishing  consideration  which  must  be  real- 
ized by  any  who  would  understand  this  city  and  its 
development :  it  is  not  that  there  is  likeness  between 
a  man  of  recent  time  and  a  man  of  long,  long  ago: 
for  although  one  was  of  old  Boston  and  the  other 
of  new  Chicago,  the  Boston  man,  born  in  the  East, 
died  in  1894,  and  the  other  was  born  in  the  West 
and  died  in  1895.  Field  started  in  life  later  than 
did  Holmes,  just  as  Chicago  started  out  later  than 
did  Boston,  but  for  many  years  the  two  writers 
were  cotemporaries,  and  they  died  within  a 
year  of  each  other.  (But  in  this  city,  where  mighty 
sums  are  expended  for  statuary  or  memorials 
which,  preferably,  shall  keep  in  mind  distinguished 
Chicagoans,  I  have  not  noticed  any  memorial  to 
Eugene  Field,  who  so  finely  represented  the  best  of 
the  city's  spirit.) 

In  book  reviews  or  comments  upon  authors  there 
has  always  been,  here,  a  keeping  away  from  the 
bland  phraseology  of  the  East.  * '  The  new  national 
library  will  have  space  for  four  million  books," 
writes  Field;  "we  mention  this  merely  to  en- 
courage Mr.  F.  Marion  Crawford  to  keep  right  on." 

135 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

That  is  all!  And  with  such  as  that  Chicago  may 
defy  the  world. 

It  was  Field  who  carried  to  perfection  "the 
column  that  made  Chicago  famous";  and  in  that 
daily  column  appeared  much  of  his  hest  work. 
Under  the  title  of  "A  Line  o'  Type  or  Two"  the 
tradition  is  continued  by  "B.  L.  T." — his  name 
being  Bert  L.  Taylor,  but  everybody  knowing  him 
by  the  initials.  And  the  city's  boast  is  that,  al- 
though every  city,  little  and  big,  follows  and  tries 
to  imitate  it,  "the  Line"  continues  to  be  the  best 
column  in  the  world.  To  "make  the  Line"  by 
having  some  quip  or  cleverness  accepted  and 
used  is  the  principal  ambition  of  many  a 
Chicagoan!  And  the  "Line"  forms  a  steady  topic 
of  conversation.  Nor  is  it  only  a  daily  column 
of  humorous  and  clever  comment;  it  is  that, 
but  it  is  more  than  that,  for  it  is  flavorous  with  easy 
and  humorous  use  of  books  and  authors,  of  the 
classics  and  history:  the  kind  of  thing  you  would 
expect  to  find  in  Boston — but  don't! 

Looking  in  the  catalogue  of  the  Chicago  Public 
Library  I  noticed  Lorimer's  "Letters  from  a  Self- 
Made  Merchant  to  his  Son"  indexed  under  "Busi- 
ness." It  would  naturally  have  been  put  under 
"Fiction";  it  might  have  been  classified  as 
"Humor"  or  "Philosophy";  and  as  a  matter  of 
fact  it  is  all  these,  including  the  classification  of 
the  library,  for  never  were  a  business  man  and 
business  matters  described  with  such  infinite  and 
constant  cleverness,  with  such  swift  felicity  of 

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SOME  BOOKS  AND  WEITEES 

phrase.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  the  author  was  in- 
spired by  a  close  acquaintance  with  one  of  the 
greatest  of  the  men  who  made  the  city;  but  the 
book,  and  its  saturation  with  human  life,  and  the 
cleverness,  are  all  Lorimer's,  and  the  literary  skill 
which  masterfully  uses  colloquialisms  to  express 
character  and  ideas.  Open  it  anywhere  and  you 
are  fascinated.  Start  to  quote  from  it  and  you 
quote  the  whole  book. 

It  sold  by  hundreds  of  thousands:  it  was  trans- 
lated into  a  score  of  languages:  yet  the  name  of 
George  Horace  Lorimer  is  barely  known  in  Chi- 
cago except  by  such  as  know  of  him  as  editor  of  an 
Eastern  periodical  of  wide  circulation.  Even  at 
the  library  they  are  surprised  to  know  of  him  as  a 
former  Chicagoan.  And  this  is  not  a  pose.  It  is 
absolute  sincerity.  It  indicates  a  rule,  not  con- 
sciously formulated  but  none  the  less  observed, 
regarding  an  author  who  goes  East.  But  an  author 
may  go  to  California  and  remain  closely  in  Chi- 
cagoan thoughts. 

Mention  of  a  magazine  is  remindful  of  a  maga- 
zine of  this  city  which  begins,  in  large  type,  a  full- 
page  newspaper  advertisement  which  is  an  excellent 
example  of  Chicagoan  advertising;  beginning,  in 
sonorously  measured  phrase:  "Fiction  has  been 
for  centuries  the  most  powerful  influence  on  the 
thought  and  conduct  of  men  and  women "  and  con- 
tinuing: "  Nathaniel  Hawthorne's  story,  'The 
Scarlet  Letter/  to  cite  but  a  single  instance,  lighted 
a  flame  of  human  compassion  in  the  breasts  of  our 

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THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

New  England  ancestors,"  and  leading  up  to: 
"This  and  other  stories  exerted  a  positive  influence 
on  the  social  and  economic  conditions  of  their  time, 
just  as  the  stories  of  our  day, ' '  which  appear  in  the 
magazine  that  is  advertising,  "point  for  this  genera- 
tion the  way  that  America  is  going,  and  must  go." 
You  see,  the  kind  of  appeal  to  intelligence  and  edu- 
cation which  you  would  expect  to  find  in  a  Boston 
advertisement — but  don't. 

Frank  Norris  left  Chicago  for  the  East  and  his 
fame  is  drifting  to  forgetfulness.  That  he  is  dead 
is  another  reason,  for  the  city,  with  a  certain  sub- 
conscious heartlessness,  which  is  only  an  expression 
of  the  virility  of  its  life,  does  not  greatly  desire  to 
be  reminded  of  those  who  have  gone.  As  if  in  con- 
tradiction of  nature,  the  sun  of  numerous  Chicago 
writers  has  set  in  the  East. 

Only  a  few  years  ago  it  seemed  that  "The  Octo- 
pus" and  "The  Pit"  could  not  be  forgotten.  But 
"The  Pit"  was  written  after  Norris  went  to  New 
York.  It  was  written  in  a  room  in  the  Italian  tower 
whose  windows  look  out  over  Washington  Square 
toward  the  Arch.  But  it  would  have  been  better,  for 
perpetuity  of  interest,  had  it  been  written  in  a  room 
looking  out  over  Lincoln  Park. 

Among  the  Chicago  types  of  Norris  is  the  young 
man  "who  always  impressed  me  as  though  he  had 
just  had  his  hair  cut";  and  the  broker's  wife  who 
"wore  turquoises  in  her  ears  morning,  noon  and 
night";  and  the  wealthy  Curtis  Jadwin  is  described 
as  sitting  down  before  his  big  new  mechanical  organ 

138 


SOME  BOOKS  AND  WRITERS 

and,  while  boasting  of  its  horse-power,  as  the  ma- 
chine thundered,  putting  his  feet  on  the  pedals,  ad- 
justing the  roll,  watching  the  sliding  slip  of  paper 
— and  feeling,  proudly,  that  he  was  doing  the  play- 
ing! 

There  is,  in  Chicago,  a  street  of  endless  dreari- 
ness, a  street  curiously  uninteresting  to  the  casual 
glance  and  more  and  more  uninteresting  to  the 
lengthening  look.  Yet  the  touch  of  genius  made 
this  street  seem  one  of  the  most  fascinating  streets 
of  the  world,  in  humanity,  in  humor,  in  tragedy  and 
kindliness.  It  is  Archer  Avenue,  in  earlier  days 
Archer  Road,  made  by  Dunne  into  "Archey  Road/' 
It  was  one  of  the  earliest  streets  of  the  city,  having 
been  laid  out  on  the  line  of  an  Indian  trail  and 
stretching  away  from  the  center  and  far  out  toward 
the  wilderness.  Finley  Peter  Dunne  originated 
"Mr.  Dooley,"  and  placed  him  on  "Archey  Road," 
and  proceeded  to  fascinate  all  America. 

How  he  described  the  people  and  their  daily 
lives :  the  priest  and  the  policeman  on  post,  the  fire- 
man, the  ward  politician,  the  parties  and  funerals 
and  wakes  and  marriages,  the  heartbreaks,  the 
rivalries,  the  triumphs :  a  world  of  its  own,  with  its 
own  happenings  and  happinesses,  its  own  stand- 
ards! You  see  politics  and  national  affairs,  too: 
and  always  you  see  through  the  eyes  of  Mr.  Dooley. 
"There's  no  betther  place  to  see  what's  go  in'  on 
thin  the  Ar-rchey  Road,"  he  said;  and  this  is  why 
he  was  so  great  a  creation. 

I  find  myself  putting  it  in  the  past  tense;  and, 

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THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

as  a  matter  of  fact,  Dunne  some  time  ago  as- 
sociated himself  with  New  York,  and — well,  "and 
there  you  are"  as  Eugene  Field  would  have  ex- 
pressed it.  After  all,  suppose  that  Dickens,  after 
his  earlier  work,  had  left  London  and  gone  to  New 
York,  would  he  have  continued  upward?  It  is  not 
so  much  a  matter  of  which  city  is  the  better  as  it  is 
a  matter  of  staying  in  your  own  environment — if 
you  have  the  right  environment. 

Dooley  was  so  extraordinarily  good!  Take  the 
unexpectedness  of  twist  of  his  "Old  men  f'r  th' 
council,  young  men  f'r  th'  ward!"  And,  for  grim- 
ness,  "His  heart  was  shriveled  up  like  a  washer- 
woman's hand." 

"Who'll  tell  what  makes  wan  man  a  thief  an' 
another  man  a  saint?"  wonders  Mr.  Dooley,  as  he 
remembers  the  "bit  iv  curly-haired  boy  that  played 
tag  around  me  place"  and  he  tells  of  Clancy,  the 
fireman,  the  pride  of  the  Koad.  "  'Wan  more,  an' 
I'll  quit.'  An'  he  did,  Jawn.  Th'  day  the  box 
factory  burnt.  'Twas  wan  iv  thim  big,  fine-lookin' 
buildings  that  pious  men  built  out  iv  cellaloid  an* 
plasther  iv  Paris.  An'  Clancy  was  wan  iv  the 
men  undher  whin  th'  wall  fell.  I  seen  thim  bring 
him  home;  an'  his  wife  met  him  at  th'  dure, 
rumplin'  her  apron  in  her  hands." 

"I  knowed  a  society  wanst  to  vote  a  monyment 
to  a  man  an'  refuse  to  help  his  fam'ly,  all  in  wan 
night,"  is  one  of  his  reminiscences  of  human  nature 
as  it  actually  is  to  be  seen. 

It  is  most  curious,  as  showing  how  a  general 

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SOME  BOOKS  AND  WRITERS 

change  may  come,  that  for  the  years  of  the  supposi- 
titious Mr.  Dooley's  popularity  it  never  occurred  to 
any  one  to  feel  either  shocked,  or  in  the  least  degree 
critical,  because  of  his  supposititious  business,  which 
was  that  of  saloon-keeper.  That  he  was  uttering 
constant  wisdom,  with  humorous  clarity  of  insight, 
was  what  made  him  so  loved,  with  always  his  in- 
tense feeling  for  humanity  and  a  hatred  of  every- 
thing wrong.  "  'Tis  cold  outside  the  dure,  ye  say, 
but  'tis  warrum  in  here ;  an'  I'm  gettin'  in  me  ol'  age 
to  think  that  the  diff 'rence  between  Hivin  an'  hell 
is  no  broader." 

Not  long  ago  Dunne  went  back  to  visit  Chicago, 
and  he  went  to  look  at  the  house  where  he  was  born ; 
and,  so  the  story  is  told,  catching  sight  of  a  tablet 
on  the  house,  "Recognition!"  he  gayly  cried,  glad 
to  think  that  honor  had  been  done  him  while  he  was 
away;  but  as  he  neared  the  house,  to  read,  he  saw 
that  it  was  merely  "For  Rent." 

George  Ade,  as  a  Chicagoan,  won  the  attention 
of  all  America  with  his  delightfully  clever 
"Fables";  and  how  he  added  to  the  joyousness  of 
life! 

Emerson  Hough  is  of  the  very  essence  of  the 
Middle  West;  born  in  Iowa,  a  Chicagoan  by  years 
of  living,  a  writer  who  has  won  wide  fame  and  who 
still  remains  a  Chicagoan.  The  very  mention  of 
his  name  brings  before  us  the  great  out-of-doors, 
the  sweeping  stretches  of  wilderness,  the  rivers 
and  mountains  and  the  Arctic  snows,  and  novels 
of  the  days  of  heroic  romance.  Good  Chicagoan 

141 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

though  he  is,  he  loves,  from  a  cheerful  perversity 
or  through  force  of  artistic  necessity,  to  locate  his 
novels  in  places  away  from  his  city.  And  what  a 
genius  he  has  for  titles!  " Fifty-four  Forty  or 
Fight";  "The  Girl  at  the  Half -Way  House";  "The 
Magnificent  Adventure";  and  that  notable  "best 
seller,"  "The  Mississippi  Bubble."  And  was 
there  ever  a  better  beginning  than  he  gave  this 
book! — "Gentlemen,  this  is  America!"  And  there 
you  see  Hough  all  unconsciously  display  himself, 
for,  more  than  anything  else,  he  is  American. 

And  remembering  that  in  one  of  his  stories  he 
tells  of  a  house  on  the  Pacific  Coast  furnished  with 
rare  antique  furniture  as  if  it  were  an  old  house 
on  the  Atlantic  Coast — for  he  well  knows  that  to 
the  lover  of  antiques  the  antiques  will  come,  even 
in  unexpected  places — it  is  pleasant  to  know  that 
his  own  home  in  Chicago  is  furnished  with  rare  and 
beautiful  specimens  of  old  furniture. 

Mention  of  that  great  success,  "The  Mississippi 
Bubble,"  leads  to  the  question:  What  other 
American  city  can  show  anything  like  as  many  lit- 
erary successes  as  Chicago?  What  other  city  can 
point  to  so  many  writers  who  have  swept  the 
country  with  their  books?  More  than  that,  what 
other  city  can  point  to  anything  even  approaching 
so  many?  New  York  claims  the  honor  of  being  the 
literary  center.  But  how  many  books  of  sweeping 
popularity  have  come  out  of  New  York!  Whereas 
Chicago  has  been  furnishing  a  steady  line  of  suc- 
cesses. 

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SOME  BOOKS  AND  WRITERS 

Long  ago  E.  P.  Roe — to  name  whom  is  to  smile 
— aroused  the  entire  country  with  his  "  Barriers 
Burned  Away."  He  felt  the  drama  and  tragedy 
of  the  Chicago  fire  and  managed  so  to  set  it  forth 
that  the  entire  nation  read  and  heeded.  Not  litera- 
ture, you  will  say?  But  at  least  Roe  had  sincerity 
and  a  homely  skill. 

A  few  years  ago  the  entire  nation  was  stirred  by 
"The  Fat  of  the  Land."  Everybody  read  it; 
everybody  talked  about  it.  And  the  odd  thing  was 
that  this  farm  book  was  written  by  a  Chicago 
doctor,  Streeter,  who  had  never  been  a  farmer! 

His  widow  explained  to  me  that  Doctor  Streeter 
had  some  slight  knowledge  of  farming  as  a  boy, 
but  that  he  became  a  doctor  and,  although  always 
dreaming  of  being  a  farmer,  was  too  busy  with  his 
practice  to  carry  out  his  dreams.  He  bought  a 
country  place  at  nearby  Lake  Forest,  but  even  that 
was  not  a  farm.  He  took  regularly,  and  carefully 
studied,  the  crop  reports  and  weather  reports  and 
Government  pamphlets  descriptive  of  plantings 
and  crops.  He  wrote  the  book  as  fiction,  and  it 
was  without  his  knowledge,  and  through  a  mis- 
understanding, so  Mrs.  Streeter  told  me,  that  the 
book  was  published  as  if  descriptive  of  facts. 

It  had  phenomenal  success,  and  letters  of  inquiry 
and  requests  for  advice  came  from  all  parts  of  this 
country  and  even  of  the  world,  and  many  pilgrim- 
aged to  Chicago  in  the  hope  of  getting  in  personal 
touch  with  the  author  and  of  getting  further  light 
on  the  age-old  problems  of  back-to-the-land. 

143 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

Streeter  told  his  wife  that  he  was  able  to  write  with 
such  assurance  because,  for  twenty-five  years,  he 
had  regularly  put  himself  to  sleep  by  working  out 
details  of  his  imaginary  farm. 

Henry  B.  Fuller  is  a  Chicagoan,  a  Chicagoan 
born.  Years  ago  he  wrote,  with  a  certain  quaint- 
ness  of  setting  and  handling,  "The  Chevalier  of 
Pensieri-Vani, "  but  he  really  found  himself  when, 
leaving  Europe  as  a  field,  he  took  up  his  own  city 
and  produced  "The  Cliff  Dwellers,"  setting  forth 
the  spirit  of  the  city  as  it  appeared  to  him,  and  with 
actual  people,  so  it  was  believed,  either  described 
or  hinted  at.  The  book,  with  its  realistic  setting, 
aroused  widespread  interest,  and  was  a  pronounced 
success. 

Sinclair's  novel  about  the  slaughter-house  work- 
ers cannot  be  included  among  books  by  writers  of 
Chicago,  but  it  is  interesting  to  name  it  as  an  ex- 
ample of  how  a  supposedly  unpromising  Chicago 
subject  may  be  made  to  yield  sweeping  popularity. 

Edgar  Lee  Masters  is  a  Chicagoan  who  has 
aroused  general  attention  with  a  book  of  verse, 
"The  Spoon  River  Anthology";  pessimistic  in  the 
extreme,  with  its  pictures  of  sordidness,  viciousness 
and  crime.  Spoon  River  is  the  name  of  an  actual 
stream,  and  it  rises  in  Bureau  County — homely 
household  nomenclature ! — and  Masters  lived  in  the 
Spoon  River  region  as  a  youth  and  here  sets  down 
what  he  now  thinks  he  saw;  making  every  one  tell 
his  own  sordid  or  wicked  life  story  in  supposititious 
epitaphs.  Maupassant  did  that  long  ago  in  prose, 

144 


SOME  BOOKS  AND  WRITERS 

in  a  vivid  short  story,  with  each  of  the  dead  writing 
a  few  words  on  his  own  headstone  with  a  bony  fore- 
finger. With  Masters,  it  is  this  volume  of  verse, 
not  without  a  certain  power  and  insight. 

In  Chicago  poets  take  themselves  and  each  other 
very,  very  seriously;  and  one,  Robert  Nicols,  ad- 
dresses Masters  as  having  a  face  with 

"The  soft  or  savage  night 

Dwelling  in  eyes  under  the  bulwark  brow" ; 

and,  after  some  lines: 

' '  Your  heart  you  catch 

To  mark  those  swart  eyes  largen  as  with  tears." 

But  really,  when  swart  eyes  begin  to  largen — why, 
there  you  are! 

1  'We  don't  use  much  poetry  here  except  in  our 
street  car  ads.,"  Lorimer  makes  a  Chicago  busi- 
ness man  say,  but  nowadays  there  is  a  large  annual 
output.  William  Vaughn  Moody  loomed  largest 
with  promise  some  years  ago,  and  suddenly  at- 
tained wide  prominence  with  ''The  Great  Divide," 
on  account  principally  of  its  dramatic  sex  appeal 
in  the  first  act.  But  he  went  down  to  New  York; 
and  I  remember  that  he  looked  unhappy  there ;  and 
after  a  while  he  ceased  from  notable  production ;  and 
died. 

Chicago  has  attained  the  marked  distinction  of 
regularly  publishing  a  "Magazine  of  Poetry,"  of 
which  Harriet  Monroe  is  editor,  and  it  sets  forth 
the  ideas  and  results  of  modern  poets,  with  especial 

145 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

regard  for  the  poets  of  this  city.  And  the  maga- 
zine marks  another  of  the  city's  steps  toward  in- 
tellectual leadership. 

In  earlier  days,  before  the  city  had  such  a  versi- 
cal  output  of  its  own,  it  was  willing  to  consider, 
as  Chicagoan,  poets  from  quite  a  distance  away, 
and  Will  Carleton,  of  Michigan,  the  Carleton  of 
"Betsey  and  I  are  Out,"  was  one  who  was  admitted 
as  a  local  man.  Eugene  Field  genially  put  in  his 
column  one  day  that :  "At  the  meeting  of  the  West 
Side  Literary  Lyceum  last  week  the  question,  'Are 
Homer's  poems  better  reading  than  Will  Carle- 
ton's?7  was  debated.  The  negative  was  sustained 
by  a  vote  of  47  to  5."  That,  again,  was  typical 
Chicago  humor.  And  what  a  zip  to  the  finish! 
Another  city  might  have  suggested  the  proposition, 
but  it  needed  Chicago  to  follow  the  humor  to  its 
logical  conclusion  with  the  imaginary  overwhelm- 
ing vote.  Carleton  was  always  ready  to  smile  at  a 
jest  upon  himself,  and  I  remember  meeting  him  in 
New  York,  one  day,  when  he  said  to  me  that  he  had 
just  been  on  a  visit  to  his  Michigan  home  town,  and 
that  while  there  they  had  honored  him  with  a  re- 
ception and  speeches,  and  that  the  principal 
speaker  had  declared  that  this,  their  home  product, 
had  won  such  fame  that  his  name  was  now  known 
over  "almost  all  of  southern  Michigan"! 

Ella  Wheeler  Wilcox,  then  of  Wisconsin,  was  also 
taken  in  as  almost  a  Chicagoan  in  those  days  of 
dearth  of  Chicago  verse;  and,  as  a  newspaper  one 
day  soberly  announced,  "We  understand  that  Mr. 

146 


SOME  BOOKS  AND  WRITERS 

Gunther,  the  autograph  virtuoso,  recently  paid  two 
hundred  and  fifty  dollars  for  an  autograph  of  Dante 
Alighieri,  which  he  discovered  on  the  fly-leaf  of  a 
volume  of  Ella  Wheeler  Wilcox's  poems." 

Dana,  of  the  New  York  Sun,  owed  to  Chicago 
the  uniqueness  that  made  him  famous.  Not  pre- 
cisely like  the  idea  of  the  Scotchman  who,  chal- 
lenged to  give  some  proof  of  his  claim  that  even 
Shakespeare  was  a  Scot,  replied,  "Look  at  his  style, 
man!"  There  is  more  than  a  matter  of  general 
style  to  the  Dana  statement,  though  the  style  may 
be  taken  as  clinching  it.  After  quitting  his  con- 
fidential post  with  the  Government,  at  the  close  of 
the  Civil  War,  Dana  took  charge  for  a  year  of  a 
newspaper  in  Chicago,  the  Republican.  He  ex- 
pected to  make  Chicago  his  permanent  home.  But 
he  did  not  succeed  there.  He  and  Chicago  did  not 
get  along  together.  Whereupon  he  secured  pos- 
session of  the  New  York  Sun,  backed,  politically 
and  financially,  by  a  group  of  powerful  men  which 
included  Conkling,  Evarts  and  other  leaders,  and 
for  the  remainder  of  his  life  he  was  himself  the 
Sun,  displaying  throughout  his  career  a  vividness 
in  writing,  a  succinct  individuality,  that  marked 
the  influence  of  his  year's  sojourn  in  Chicago. 
Without  identifying  himself  with  Chicago,  he  was 
inspired  and  filled  with  the  spirit  of  the  city,  and 
it  accented  and  aided  his  natural  uniqueness  of 
thought  and  expression. 

Chicago  is  a  great  publishing  city.  There  are 
over  five  hundred  listed  under  that  classification, 

147 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

besides  music  publishers,  law  publishers,  news- 
paper publishers  and  others,  and  a  great  number 
listed  as  printers. 

"Who's  Who  in  America"  is  published  here. 
Telephone  books  and  city  directories  are  turned 
out  in  tremendous  number.  Here,  too,  are  printed 
and  published  the  books  of  Harold  Bell  Wright, 
or  at  least  some  of  them,  with  such  figures  (not 
looked  upon  here  as  astonishing!)  as  first  editions  of 
two  hundred  thousand.  Not  long  ago,  by  the  way, 
Wright  was  offered  sixty  thousand  dollars  for  the 
serial  rights  of  a  new  story,  but  he  refused,  pre- 
ferring not  to  have  it  published  before  it  came  out 
in  book  form.  Although  not  precisely  of  Chicago, 
Wright  was  near  enough,  for  a  time,  to  be  ranged 
under  the  Chicago  banner  with  his  amazing  sales; 
and  his  sojourning  in  California  caused  him  no  loss 
of  consideration  here.  But  what  a  curious  life  rec- 
ord has  been  his!  Beginning  life  as  a  decorator 
and  painter;  turning  to  landscape  painting;  then 
taking  up  the  writing  of  religious  romances  with 
an  utterly  astonishing  success. 

The  biggest  printing  plant  in  the  world,  as  it  is 
termed,  is  here.  And  among  the  publishers  you 
hear  such  statements  as,  "We  printed  a  million  and 
a  half  of  this  catalogue  last  year,"  or  "We  shall 
print,  as  only  a  part  of  our  work,  more  than  a  mil- 
lion school  books  this  year,"  or,  "We  annually  put 
out  millions  of  telephone  directories,  for  various 
cities."  As  I  write,  the  zone  system,  for  United 
States  mail,  is  promising  to  make  Chicago  a  center 

148 


SOME  BOOKS  AND  WRITERS     . 

for  important  publications  heretofore  brought  out 
in  the  East,  and  some  big  strikes  have  also  had  the 
effect  of  turning  publishers'  thoughts  Chicagoward. 

When  the  creator  of  " Sherlock  Holmes"  visited 
Chicago  he  was  recognized  by  the  cabman,  who  ex- 
plained, when  asked,  "Well,  sir,  of  course  all  the 
members  of  the  Cabmen's  Literary  Guild  knew  you 
were  coming  on  this  train,  and  I  noticed,  sir,  if  you 
will  excuse  me,  that  your  hair  has  the  cut  of  a  Phila- 
delphia Quaker  barber,  that  your  hat  shows  on  the 
brim  in  front  where  you  tightly  grasped  it  at  a 
Milwaukee  literary  lunch;  your  right  overshoe  has 
on  it  a  block  of  Buffalo  mud  and  on  the  top  of  your 
bag  are  the  crumbs  of  a  doughnut  which  could  only 
have  been  bought  at  the  Springfield  station;  and 
then,  sir,  to  make  sure,  I  happened  to  see,  stencilled 
in  plain  letters  on  the  end  of  the  bag,  the  name, 
'Conan  Doyle.'  " 

For  a  time  this  was  noted  as  a  city  where  rich 
men  become  authors,  by  proxy;  they  had  their 
names  on  the  title  page  and  found  somebody  to  do 
the  work.  And  one  such  man,  of  nation-wide 
financial  fame,  was  so  proud  of  his  name  on  a  book 
that  it  all  seemed  true,  and  he  even  sent  one  of  his 
copies,  autographed  by  himself  as  author,  to  the 
man  who  had  done  it  all. 

The  city  is  not  without  real  authors  of  social 
distinction,  who  really  write  their  own  books  and 
do  it  with  literary  skill;  and  one  of  them  is  often 
referred  to  with  awe  as  "the  first  gentleman  of 


Chicago!" 


149 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

And  it  is  pleasant  to  think  that,  at  least  once, 
appreciation  of  Chicago  was  expressed  by  a  Bos- 
tonian,  for  William  James  took  pains  to  write,  in 
his  "Memories  and  Studies,"  of  the  "exquisite 
book  of  Chicago  sketches"  by  Edith  Wyatt,  en- 
titled ' '  Every  One  His  Own  Way. ' ' 

Oscar  Wilde  made  an  unexpected  reference  to 
Chicago  in  a  lecture  in  which  he  spoke  of  how 
machinery  should  be  valued  if  it  does  its  best  pos- 
sible work.  "A  train,  that  whirls  an  ordinary 
Englishman  through  Italy  at  the  rate  of  forty  miles 
an  hour  and  finally  sends  him  home  without  any 
memory  of  that  lovely  country  but  that  he  was 
cheated  by  a  courier  at  Rome  or  that  he  got  a  bad 
dinner  at  Verona,  does  not  do  him  or  civilization 
much  good.  But  that  swift  legion  of  fiery-footed 
engines  that  bore  to  the  burning  ruins  of  Chicago 
the  loving  help  and  generous  treasure  of  the  world 
was  as  noble  and  as  beautiful  as  any  golden  troop 
of  angels  that  ever  fed  the  hungry  and  clothed  the 
naked  in  the  antique  times." 

And  the  Great  Fire  influenced  another  English- 
man, the  author  of  "Tom  Brown's  School  Days," 
in  a  noble  way.  For  Hughes  loved  Chicago.  He 
was  here  in  1870  and  was  touched  and  moved  by 
his  welcome.  And  he  wrote  that  "this  place  is  the 
wonder  of  the  wonderful  West."  The  next  year 
came  the  fire,  and  Hughes  saw  his  opportunity. 
He  personally  interested  the  authors  and  pub- 
lishers of  Great  Britain;  and  the  Public  Library 
of  Chicago  was  founded  with  some  thousands  of 

150 


SOME  BOOKS  AND  WEITEES 

volumes  given  at  his  request,  among  the  donors 
being  Herbert  Spencer  and  Huxley,  Charles  Kings- 
ley  and  John  Stuart  Mill,  John  Bright,  Palgrave 
and  Charlotte  Yonge,  Kossetti,  Dean  Stanley, 
Samuel  Smiles,  Disraeli  and  Gladstone;  and  there 
was  even,  among  the  thousands  of  volumes,  "The 
Early  Years  of  the  Prince  Consort,"  which  was 
"Presented  to  the  new  Free  Library  of  Chicago, 
by  Victoria  Eegina.  Balmoral,  November  13, 
1871."  And  the  library  has  developed  nobly  from 
such  a  noble  foundation. 

Its  building  stands  on  the  Lake  Front,  close  to 
the  heart  of  business  Chicago.  And  I  know  of  no 
other  city  where  a  library  is  so  freely  used  by  so 
many  kinds  of  people.  It  attracts  all  classes. 
And  a  charming  feature  is  that  at  the  library,  al- 
most as  if  it  were  a  club,  one  may  meet  delightful 
and  interesting  people,  those  connected  with  litera- 
ture, art,  and  civic  movements.  The  library  is  in- 
fused with  such  a  spirit,  under  the  influence  of 
Librarian  Eoden  and  Miss  Elliott,  as  to  draw,  with 
its  hundreds  of  thousands  of  volumes,  the  cog- 
nescenti  and  the  hoi  polloi,  the  literati  and,  so  to 
speak,  the  illiterati. 

In  some  cities  there  is  something  slighting,  felt 
or  implied,  in  the  idea  of  going  to  a  public  library; 
but  not  in  Chicago!  The  people  here  not  only  use 
its  books  freely  but  it  has  become  so  friendly  a 
feature  of  life  that  many  a  person  drops  in,  or  tele- 
phones, to  ask  about  some  point  of  grammar  or 
pronunciation,  or  the  author  of  some  quotation, 

151 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

or  to  know  the  precise  location  of  some  town  in 
France  or  Florida. 

The  building  is  excellent,  of  dignified  classic  de- 
sign, with  arched  windows,  with  columns,  with 
elaborate  entablatures.  The  massive  elliptical 
arch  of  the  main  staircase,  as  you  enter  from  Wash- 
ington Street,  and  the  landings  and  archways  as 
you  mount  the  broad  marble  steps,  are  admirable; 
and  there  is  much  of  an  ornate  glittering,  as  in  all 
11  encrusted  architecture,"  in  mosaics  of  glass  and 
mother-of-pearl,  and  in  marble  of  green  and  white. 

To  carry  out  the  idea  of  popular  service,  there 
are  more  than  two  score  branches  and  a  hundred 
and  twenty-five  delivery  stations  and  more  than 
half  a  hundred  deposit  stations.  One  of  the 
branches,  the  Blackstone,  is  positively  beautiful, 
a  smallish  building  of  marble  and  granite,  with 
low  dome  and  pillared  entrance. 

There  are  two  other  important  libraries  in  the 
city,  both  of  them  heavily  endowed,  and  possessing 
great  and  notable  collections:  the  Newberry, 
specializing  in  history  and  the  fine  arts,  and  the 
Crerar,  specializing  in  science.  Chicago  is  indeed 
a  city  of  magnificent  libraries,  for  there  is  also  the 
fine  University  Library,  and  the  remarkable  Eyer- 
son  library  at  the  Art  Institute. 

The  central  building  of  the  Public  Library  holds 
more  than  books ;  it  holds  what,  in  a  way,  represents 
the  greatest  triumph  of  Chicago:  the  central  offices 
of  the  American  Library  Association,  which  sends, 
throughout  the  country,  reviews,  magazine  cata- 

152 


SOME  BOOKS  AND  WRITERS 

logues,  bulletins,  and  "The  Booklist,"  and  keeps 
practically  every  library  in  the  country  supplied 
with  the  most  recent  literary  information.  It  has 
a  membership  of  over  three  thousand,  scattered 
through  every  State  of  the  Union  and  much  of 
Canada  and  even  extending  to  some  of  the 
European  cities.  It  is  a  delicate  and  highly  im- 
portant work  that  the  "A.  L.  A."  performs  and  the 
city  which  possesses  its  headquarters  may  properly 
feel  itself  a  literary  center:  and  Chicago  feels  it 
the  more  pleasurably  from  the  fact  that  the  "A. 
L.  A."  was  transplanted  to  the  Lake  Front  from 
Beacon  Street  in  Boston ! 

The  city  has  always  attracted,  as  visitors,  many 
authors  not  Chicagoan;  and  I  was  told  of  an  old 
gentleman  who,  in  the  lobby  of  the  old  Tremont 
House,  was  listening  to  a  story  of  a  poker  game  in 
which  Sol  Smith  Russell,  the  actor,  was  a  partici- 
pant. "Do  you  dare  to  tell  me,  sir,  that  my  son-in- 
law  plays  cards  ? ' '  suddenly  cried  the  old  gentleman : 
and  it  turned  out  that  he  was  William  Taylor  Adams, 
whose  books  had  given  delight  to  millions  of  boys: 
for  Adams  was  "Oliver  Optic." 

I  think  that  the  oddest  of  all  literary  happen- 
ings has  to  do  with  Chicago.  For  one  S.  E.  Gross 
had  written  a  play  called  "The  Merchant  Prince 
of  Cornville,"  and  he  claimed  that  "Cyrano  de 
Bergerac"  was  plagiarized  from  it  by  the  French- 
man, Rostand,  who  had  just  been  made  an  "Immor- 
tal" by  the  French  Academy  on  account  of  his  play; 
and  Gross  went  into  court  in  1912,  his  chief  re- 

153 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

liance  being  a  John  McGovern,  who  had  for  sixteen 
years  been  on  the  staff  of  a  Chicago  paper  and  who 
worked  on  the  case  with  such  perseverance  that 
he  was  able  to  dumbfound  a  United  States  judge, 
sitting  in  Chicago,  with  a  list  of  over  seven  hun- 
dred "deadly  parallels"!  Whereupon,  the  court, 
deciding  for  Gross,  actually  issued  an  injunction 
against  the  presentation  of  "Cyrano"! 

Year  by  year  the  Chicago  injunction  held.  As 
recently  as  March  of  1920,  when  a  company  at 
length  prepared  to  present  "Cyrano"  in  New  York, 
the  Gross  estate  brought  forward  the  old  injuction, 
but  a  New  York  judge  refused  to  uphold  it. 


CHAPTER  XI 


HOW   ABT    CAME   TO   CHICAGO 

N  front  of  the  portrait  of 
General  Dearborn,  in  the 
Art  Institute,  a  devoted 
Chicagoan  was  standing. 
He  looked  with  evident  in- 
terest at  the  florid  and 
agreeable  face,  at  the  double- 
chin  and  the  high-brushed 
hair,  with  interest  at  the 
fascinating  uniform,  of  dark 
blue  with  much  of  gold,  and 
with  white  ruffles  and  red  sash.  That 
it  was  a  Gilbert  Stuart  and  that  Dearborn  was 
of  a  type  which  that  greatest  of  American  artists 
dearly  loved  to  paint,  that  in  fact  Stuart  had 
painted  Dearborn  at  least  twice,  the  man  may  not 
have  known,  but  he  knew  that  it  was  the  por- 
trait of  the  distinguished  general  after  whom  old 
Fort  Dearborn,  at  the  mouth  of  the  Chicago  Elver, 
was  named.  "And  what's  that  medal  he's  wear- 
ing?" he  asked;  and  when  his  companion  told  him 
that  it  was  the  insignia  of  the  Order  of  the  Cin- 
cinnati he  was  instantly  in  a  burst  of  anger.  "Cin- 
cinnati! What's  Cincinnati  got  to  do  with  our 

155 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

Dearborn!  He  ought  to  wear  some  order  of 
Chicago  I" 

Another  picture,  a  landscape,  in  the  Art  Institute, 
might  well  be  thought  to  represent  the  mouth  of  the 
Chicago,  although  it  was  painted  by  a  man  who 
never  saw  this  city.  The  darkly  mysterious  water, 
in  the  painting,  is  the  very  hue  of  clayey  green  so 
often  seen  in  the  Chicago  River  and  in  the  lake 
near  shore.  The  sky  is  of  clay-green  hue.  There 
are  a  few  touches  of  land  and  ships  in  black.  The 
picture,  in  the  mysteriousness  of  its  dark  colorings, 
is  an  English  scene  by  James  McNeill  Whistler;  it 
is  one  of  his  " Nocturnes' ';  and  even  before  see- 
ing this  picture  the  impression  had  come  to  me  that 
the  color  effects  in  Chicago  are  often  like  those  of 
some  of  the  " Nocturnes."  Whistler  could  have 
put  on  canvas  the  color  effects  of  Chicago.  And, 
odd  man  that  he  was,  he  would  have  cut  a  strik- 
ing figure  here.  St.  Gaudens,  himself  closely 
associated  artistically  with  Chicago,  describes 
Whistler,  whom  he  knew  in  London,  as  "a  very  at- 
tractive man  with  queer  clothes,  a  kind  of  1830  coat 
with  an  enormous  collar,  a  monocle,  a  strong  jaw, 
very  frizzly  hair  with  a  white  mesh  in  it,  and  an 
extraordinary  hat." 

And  Whistler  would  have  liked  to  see  this  city, 
not  only  for  its  nocturne  effects  but  because  of  his 
own  association  with  Chicago.  For  Whistler's 
grandfather  was  Captain  John  Whistler,  sent  in 
1803  by  General  Dearborn  to  build  the  fort  here, 
and  retained  in  command  of  the  post  for  seven 

156 


HOW  AET  CAME  TO  CHICAGO 

years,  when  lie  turned  it  over  to  that  Heald  whom 
we  have  seen  acting  so  disastrously. 

Captain  Whistler  was  assisted,  in  building  Fort 
Dearborn,  by  his  son  George,  afterwards  to  be- 
come a  civil  engineer  in  Eussian  railway  building: 
and,  which  is  of  much  more  importance,  also  to  be- 
come the  father  of  the  artist. 

So  Whistler,  the  distinguished  painter,  although 
he  never  came  to  Chicago,  was  grandson  of  the  of- 
ficer who  built  this  fort.  An  uncle  of  the  artist  was 
also  here,  William  Whistler,  who  entered  the  army 
and  attained  the  rank  of  lieutenant-colonel,  the 
height  of  six  feet  two,  and  the  weight  of  two  hun- 
dred and  sixty  pounds. 

There  is  an  odd  Chicago  connection  between  the 
author  Kipling  and  the  artist  Whistler,  for  a  close 
companion,  at  Fort  Dearborn,  of  Whistler's  father, 
was  the  John  Kinzie  who  adopted  the  girl  who  be- 
came grandmother  of  the  wife  of  Eudyard  Kipling. 

A  daughter  of  this  John  Kinzie,  and  therefore 
granddaughter  of  the  original  John  Kinzie,  was 
born  in  Chicago  in  1835  and,  for  years  enjoying 
the  distinction  of  the  oldest  living  white  child  born 
in  Chicago,  lived  until  the  extremely  modern  year 
of  1917.  She  looks  down  from  the  walls  of  the 
Art  Institute,  an  adorable  young  woman  with  lovely 
eyes,  exquisitely  dressed  in  a  low-cut  party  gown 
which  phows  the  tips  of  her  softly-rounded  girlish 
shoulders  and  her  rounded  girlish  arms.  The  por- 
trait was  painted  in  1856,  the  year  before  her  mar- 
riage, by  Healy,  who  had  such  an  influence  on  art 

157 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

in  Chicago  and  who  might  in  a  sense  be  termed  the 
Gilbert  Stuart  of  the  city. 

George  Peter  Alexander  Healy — with  the  first 
names  usually  shortened  to  G.  P.  A. — was  a  Boston 
boy  whose  grandfather  was  painted  by  Gilbert 
Stuart;  and  the  lad  never  forgot  the  thrill  of  once 
catching  a  glimpse  of  the  mighty  artist. 

In  beginning  to  be  a  painter,  Healy  felt  that  he 
must  portray  a  beautiful  woman,  and  he  fixed  upon 
Mrs.  Harrison  Gray  Otis,  one  of  the  leaders  of  the 
socially  elect.  A  friend  gave  him  a  note  of  intro- 
duction but  even  with  that  he  hesitated  and  paced 
back  and  forth  in  front  of  the  Beacon  Hill  home. 
But  at  length  he  lifted  the  knocker  and  was  ad- 
mitted :  he  told  Mrs.  Otis  of  his  ambition ;  he  was  a 
lad  of  eighteen,  and  she  liked  his  looks  and  his 
manner,  and,  grande  dame  though  she  was  she  was 
flattered;  and  he  found  a  friend. 

He  studied  in  Paris.  He  went  everywhere,  saw 
everybody.  He  painted  the  Duke  of  Sussex,  uncle 
of  Queen  Victoria,  and  described  him  as  a  tall,  bald- 
headed  man  who  used  to  sing,  to  his  own  guitar  ac- 
companiment, to  his  tiny  morganatic  lady-love  of 
only  five  feet.  Healy  painted  King  Louis  Philippe, 
and  the  King  told  of  Gilbert  Stuart,  whom  he  had 
met  on  his  strange  journeyings  before  kingship 
came,  and  he  had  Healy  paint  him  a  copy  of 
Stuart's  Washington.  He  painted  the  singer 
Braham,  who  figures  so  much  in  memoirs  of  the  first 
half  of  the  nineteenth  century,  and  he  said  that 
Braham  was  really  a  Hebrew  named  Abraham. 

158 


THE  ART  INSTITUTE 


OF  THE 
UNIVERSITY  OF  ILLINOIS 


HOW  ART  CAME  TO  CHICAGO 

He  painted  one  of  Napoleon's  marshals,  the  mighty 
Soult.  He  painted  Pope  Pius  the  Ninth,  and  told 
of  an  American,  admitted  to  audience,  who  refused 
to  bend  when  expected  to  do  so,  at  which  the  Pope 
only  said,  kindly,  "My  son,  an  old  man's  blessing 
never  did  harm  to  any  one."  He  painted  Carmen 
Sylva,  Princess  of  Rumania  and  afterwards  to  be 
Queen,  but  then  little  known,  and  he  tells  of  how  he 
painted  her  in  her  national  costume,  in  red  skirt, 
and  red  morocco  shoes  and  with  embroideries  of  red 
and  gold. 

In  America  he  painted  Webster,  Clay,  Pierce, 
General  Cass.  He  painted  President  Buchanan. 
He  painted  Lincoln,  who  said  to  him  that  a  lady  had 
written,  urging  him  to  wear  false  whiskers  to  hide 
his  ugliness;  and  he  said  to  Healy,  laughingly, 
"Will  you  paint  me  with  false  whiskers?"  He 
went  to  the  White  House  to  paint  President  Arthur 
and,  while  waiting  in  an  anteroom,  saw  on  the  wall 
a  painting  of  his  own  of  a  long-past  President,  John 
Quincy  Adams,  painted  in  1845,  long  after  the  term 
of  Adams  was  over.  He  painted  General  Sherman. 
He  painted  Jefferson  Davis,  who  told  him  a  de- 
lightful story  of  the  obstinacy  of  Andrew  Jackson. 
"The  horse  was  seventeen  feet  high,"  said  Jack- 
son. "Hands,  you  mean,  General,"  murmured  a 
friend  beside  him.  "What  did  I  say?"  "You 
said  seventeen  feet."  "Then,  by  the  eternal,  it 
was  seventeen  feet!" 

Healy 's  connection  with  Chicago  came  through 
his  meeting  with  William  B.  Ogden,  in  Paris  in 

159 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

1855.  Ogden  had  been  the  first  mayor  of  Chicago 
and  was  a  man  of  power.  He  told  Healy  of  the 
certain  future  of  the  city  and  urged  him  to  go  there, 
and  from  that  year  Healy  was  a  Chicagoan,  with, 
of  course,  absences  for  visits  and  work  in  other 
places. 

In  Chicago  he  seems  to  have  painted  everybody 
worth  painting.  He  painted  Ogden  himself;  and 
among  the  host  of  other  names  were  those  of 
Sheldon,  Arnold  and  Skinner,  Newberry  and 
Blatchford  and  Blair  and  Kinzie.  Always  he 
painted  with  a  certain  verity,  a  certain  quality,  and 
he  was  of  enormous  industry.  Born  in  1808,  he 
died  in  1894,  rounding  out,  with  his  life,  the  period 
from  before  the  Chicago  Massacre  to  after  the 
Chicago  World's  Fair! 

His  portraits  are  prized  possessions;  incontest- 
able proof  of  a  family's  ancient  lineage,  as  it  has 
been  aptly  expressed;  I  think  by  Hobart  Chatfield 
Chatfield- Taylor.  There  are  family  traditions  re- 
garding the  saving  of  Healy  portraits  at  the  time 
of  the  Great  Fire.  Newberry  library  has  many 
examples  of  his  work,  in  originals,  and  in  copies  by 
himself;  and  a  few  of  his  portraits  are  in  the  Art 
Institute.  There,  also,  in  the  Institute,  is  himself 
by  himself:  black-haired,  black-coated,  white-tied; 
and  there  is  his  portrait  of  his  brown-eyed  wife,  in 
gown  of  black  velvet.  In  the  same  room,  this  being 
one  of  the  charming  features  of  the  Art  Institute, 
recognizing  as  it  does  art  in  various  lines,  are  a 
Duncan  Phyfe  table,  and  two  adorable  Chippen- 

160 


HOW  ART  CAME  TO  CHICAGO 

dales,  and  a  capable  square-backed  Sheraton :  these 
being  among  the  numerous  examples  of  fine  old 
furniture  placed  in  the  various  rooms.  And  it  is 
still  told,  that  before  close  knowledge  of  antique 
furniture  came  here,  a  visitor  aroused  resentment 
by  remarking  that  there  were  numerous  fakes. 
"But  you  are  not  an  expert,"  he  was  told.  "No; 
I  am  not  an  expert;  but  one  need  not  be  an  expert 
to  see  that  those  are  fakes."  And  soon  there  was  a 
weeding  out  and  a  gathering  anew. 

There,  too,  in  the  Institute,  is  the  superb  Gunsau- 
lus  collection  of  old  Wedgwood ;  a  collection  surpass- 
ing those  of  Wedgwood  in  London,  New  York,  Bos- 
ton or  Philadelphia,  and  unequaled  except  by  the 
collection  at  the  Wedgwood  works  at  Etruria,  where 
still  the  manufacture  is  carried  on  by  descendants 
of  the  great  founder,  and  where  two  or  three  build- 
ings are  still  standing  that  were  used  by  Josiah 
himself,  where  one  may  meet  a  great-great-grand- 
son, and  where  may  be  seen,  in  a  distant  church,  the 
monument  to  Wedgwood  by  the  fine  artist  Flaxman, 
who  worked  so  intimately  with  him. 

Chicago,  although  interested  in  the  best  of 
European  art,  gives  especial  attention  to  the  artists 
of  America  and  particularly  to  those  of  this  city. 

The  Friends  of  American  Art,  an  organization 
nobly  conceived,  have  gathered  at  the  Institute  the 
work  of  the  best  American  artists,  of  the  past  and 
the  present,  including  Gilbert  Stuart  and  Benjamin 
West,  Copley  and  Sargent,  John  W.  Alexander 
and  Eobert  Henri,  and  others,  among  whom  should 

161 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

be  named  Ealph  Clarkson,  not  only  an  artist  of  ad- 
mirable skill  but  one  around  whom  largely  revolves 
the  city's  art  life.  In  his  early  days  Clarkson  was 
delightfully  encouraged  by  Whittier  the  poet.  For 
although  a  Chicagoan,  now  and  for  many  years 
past,  he  lived  as  a  boy  and  a  lad  in  Whittier 's  town, 
Amesbury,  Massachusetts,  and  he  knew  and  honored 
Whittier,  and  when  he  returned  from  several  years 
of  art  study  in  Boston  and  Paris,  Whittier,  then 
very  old,  sent  word  that  he  would  like  to  see  him, 
and  Clarkson  found  him  tall  and  thin  and  stately 
as  of  old  and,  as  of  old,  dressed  in  garments  which 
accentuated  the  stateliness,  the  thinness  and  the 
height.  The  old  poet  was  keenly  alive  to  the  work 
of  the  young  painter.  Clarkson  remarked  on  the 
poet's  love  of  nature,  and  Whittier  replied,  "Yes, 
I  have  always  loved  nature,  and  the  promise  that 
she  made  me  in  my  youth  she  has  kept  in  my  old 
age  and  she  grows  more  and  more  beautiful  to  my 
sight." 

Clarkson  is  one  of  the  artists  who  resort  in  the 
summer  months  to  the  little  town  of  Oregon,  in  the 
Eock  River  valley ;  and  there  is  a  Ganymede  Spring 
there,  but  it  is  not  a  modern  christening  by  some 
artist  of  to-day,  but  received  its  name  some  three 
quarters  of  a  century  ago,  from  the  original  of  the 
highly  picturesque  Zenobia,  of  * '  The  Blithedale  Ro- 
mance," who  in  real  life  was  the  writer,  Margaret 
Fuller,  who  visited  out  here  in  Illinois,  at  Oregon. 

Chicago  itself,  as  a  city,  has  begun  to  purchase 
paintings  by  artists  who  have  lived  here  for  at 

162 


HOW  ART  CAME  TO  CHICAGO 

least  two  years,  and  the  pictures  are  to  be  peri- 
patetically  exhibited  in  various  public  buildings  and 
in  the  public  schools. 

When  one  thinks,  to  use  the  quaint  old  Shakes- 
perean  phrase,  of  "the  memorials 'and  the  works  of 
art  that  do  adorn  the  city,"  the  mind  goes  at  once, 
here,  to  the  Art  Institute.  It  is  a  part  of  the  city's 
daily  life.  Each  year  more  than  a  million  people 
enter  its  doors.  One  who  may  be  considered  the 
dean  of  Chicago  authors  told  me  that  when  he  wrote 
an  article  about  the  Institute  for  one  of  the  lead- 
ing magazines  of  New  York,  in  which  he  stated  that 
the  Institute  had  more  visitors  than  any  other 
art  museum  in  America,  he  was  amazed  to  find  this 
altered,  in  the  proofs,  by  the  addition  of  "except 
the  Metropolitan  Museum  of  New  York."  But  it 
has  vastly  more  visitors  than  the  Metropolitan,  and 
is  claimed  to  have  twice  as  many  as  the  Boston 
Museum  of  Fine  Arts  and  four  times  as  many  as  the 
Philadelphia  Academy. 

It  is  among  the  few  best  art  museums  of  the  world 
in  its  high  proportion  of  the  eminently  good.  An 
odd  feature  is  that  it  annually  sells  over  two  hun- 
dred thousand  postcards  with  pictures  upon  them 
of  some  of  its  artistic  treasures.  And  to  show  how 
it  holds  the  public  love  it  need  only  be  said  that  it 
has  a  membership  of  seven  thousand,  many  of  whom 
have  given  it  large  sums. 

It  is  saturated  with  the  very  spirit  of  art,  and  at 
the  same  time  is  full  of  the  city's  dynamic  energy. 
The  present  building  was  opened  in  1893  and  has 

163 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

not  been  closed  for  a  single  day,  since,  either  Sun- 
day or  weekday! 

The  building  stands  on  the  Lake  Front  at  the  foot 
of  Adams  Street,  and  is  thus  close  to  the  very  heart 
of  the  city.  It  stands  by  itself,  detached,  with  great 
open  space  on  either  side  and  with  a  noble  back- 
ground and  setting  of  lake  and  sky.  And  the  first 
thought  is  that,  Florentine-like,  some  of  its  best 
art  is  open  to  the  view  of  the  passers-by,  on  the  ter- 
races or  seen  through  open  arches. 

The  building  is  beautiful.  It  is  extraordinarily 
effective.  It  is  built  of  gray  limestone,  in  the  style 
of  the  Italian  Renaissance,  with  classic  Ionic  and 
Corinthian  details.  It  is  three  hundred  and  twenty 
feet  across  and  is  terraced  on  front  and  side  with 
superb  stone  balustrades. 

Go  up  the  broad  steps  that  front  the  central  por- 
tion, past  the  monumental  lions  of  Kemys.  Above 
you,  with  open  arches,  are  niched  statues,  Loggia 
dei  Lanzi-like.  On  the  level  of  the  entrance  is  a 
niched  copy  of  Houdon's  Washington:  the  original 
being  at  Richmond,  Virginia;  and  there  comes  the 
memory  of  the  Frenchman's  visit  to  America,  sent 
by  Franklin  and  welcomed  so  cordially  by  Wash- 
ington. Within  the  building  is  Houdon's  Joel  Bar- 
low, the  Connecticut  poet  who  died,  with  Napoleon's 
army,  on  the  retreat  from  Moscow. 

You  enter,  and,  before  you,  there  are  steps  lead- 
ing up,  and  they  separate  and  continue  upward  on 
either  side,  with  the  Nike  of  Samothrace  superbly 
facing  you,  as  in  the  Louvre. 

164 


HOW  ART  CAME  TO  CHICAGO 

The  entire  entrance  system  is  splendidly  planned, 
on  the  grand  scale.  To  the  right,  through  an  arch- 
wayed  vista,  is  seen  a  great  cast  of  Donatello  's  Gat- 
tamelata,  made  for  the  Signoria  of  Venice;  that 
superb  equestrian  which  still  stands  in  the  Piazza 
di  Saint 'Antonio  in  Padua.  Through  an  arched 
vista  to  the  left  is  seen  a  great  cast,  matching  it, 
of  Verrocchio's  noble  equestrian  of  Colleoni.  And 
how  old  Italian  stories  come  flocking!  Of  Dona- 
tello's  hastening  home  from  Padua  from  fear  that 
flattery  would  turn  his  head ;  of  Verrocchio  's  defiant 
leaving  of  Venice  because  his  pride  was  touched, 
and  of  how  the  rulers  threatened  to  take  his  life 
if  ever  he  should  return ;  and  of  how  they  lured  him 
back  with  honeyed  words,  and  how,  the  statue  al- 
most completed,  he  suddenly  died — of  course,  from 
perfectly  natural  causes! 

In  a  causeway,  between  these  two  great  equestrian 
statues,  is  a  tawny  II  Marzocco,  the  Lion  of  Flor- 
ence, of  the  Bargello,  and  it  is  so  a  lion  of  an  impres- 
sion, so  upsitting  a  lion,  so  cute  and  pawky  a  lion, 
with  paw  on  escutcheon,  as  to  give  a  final  touch  on 
entering  the  building. 

It  is  well  to  speak  with  enthusiasm  of  this  Insti- 
tute, for  to  understand  it  and  the  forces  behind  it  is 
to  understand  Chicago.  From  the  earliest  days,  one 
remerubers,  even  when  Chicago  superficially  seemed 
all  rawness  and  roughness,  there  were  people  here 
of  the  finest  inherited  traditions;  always,  that  has 
been  recognized  by  intelligent  visitors  from  abroad, 
much  more  than  by  Americans  from  the  East.  And 

165 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

this  Art  Institute  is  a  shining  light,  an  accomplished 
result,  to  show  what  taste  and  knowledge  and  energy 
and  money  can  accomplish. 

Here  (not  copies,  but  rare  and  precious  originals) 
are  examples  of  the  work  of  the  masters.  Here  are 
Corot  and  Daubigny,  here  are  the  stately  Rubens 
and  the  magnificent  Rembrandt,  here — one  may 
only  name  a  few,  almost  at  random — here  are  the 
beauty  and  mystery  of  Monet,  such  as  the  Venetian 
San  Giorgio,  with  buildings  of  blue  and  gray  and 
red,  with  sky  and  water  all  magic  blue  and  green, 
such  as  you  see  in  going  by  gondola  to  Murano. 
Here  is  Eaeburn,  painter  of  men ;  but  this  example 
is  his  "Jean";  and  how  she  would  have  been  amazed 
could  she  have  known,  in  her  home  near  the  Tros- 
sachs  which  Scott  made  so  famous,  that  this  paint- 
ing, with  its  background  of  the  wonderful  Scottish 
hills  stretching  away  for  miles,  should  within  a  cen- 
tury find  its  way  to  a  distant  city  on  the  level  flats 
of  an  interior  lake  of  North  America !  Here  is  Win- 
slow  Homer,  "whose  name  was  writ  in  water." 
Here  is  Chase's  "Alice,"  expressing  the  joyousness 
of  youth.  Here  is  a  superb  full  length  by  Henri,  a 
lady,  all  in  black.  Here  is  a  recent  portrait  of 
Joseph  Pennell  by  Wayman  Adams,  a  striking  pre- 
sentation of  the  long,  lean,  earnest  etcher. 

No  other  individual  artist  is  so  honored  here  as 
Inness.  For  there  is  a  room  devoted  entirely  to 
him ;  to  a  score  of  his  paintings ;  and  one  sees  here 
his  sunsets  and  sunrises  and  mists,  his  sweet  dis- 
tances and  his  trees  and  distant  hills;  one  sees 

166 


HOW  AET  CAME  TO  CHICAGO 

American  scenery  so  presented  by  an  American 
artist,  with  rich  coloring  and  misty  sheen  and  softly 
glowing  beauty,  as  to  show  what  a  paintable  land 
this  is.  It  is  a  triumph  which  Inness  himself  would 
have  profoundly  appreciated ;  and  especially  because 
he  would  have  remembered  the  immense  contrast  of 
this  with  his  visit  to  Chicago  in  the  days  when  he 
had  modestly  to  count  his  dollars. 

After  establishing  himself  and  his  wife  at  a  hotel, 
on  that  long-ago  visit,  he  left  his  card  at  the 
proprietor's  office,  and  shortly  afterwards  was  sur- 
prised by  the  coming  of  a  bell-boy,  who  deftly 
gathered  up  their  belongings  and,  saying  that  their 
room  was  changed,  led  the  way  to  the  most  elaborate 
suite  in  the  hotel,  Inness  uttering  no  objection  but 
thinking  that  he  would  stand  the  expense  for  a  day 
and  that  then  they  would  quietly  leave.  But  there 
came  a  note  from  the  proprietor,  Potter  Palmer, 
saying  that  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Inness  were  to  be  his  guests 
while  in  Chicago  and  sending,  with  his  note,  baskets 
of  fruit  and  flowers.  It  reads  like  a  pleasant  fairy 
tale. 

Outside  of  the  southern  end  of  the  Art  Institute 
has  been  erected  the  Fountain  of  the  Great  Lakes, 
by  Lorado  Taft,  who  was  commissioned  from  a  fund 
of  a  million  dollars  whose  income  is  for  monuments, 
in  Chicago,  to  men  and  women  prominent  in  Amer- 
ican life,  or  for  the  commemoration  of  American 
events. 

Under  the  Institute  roof,  or  rather  in  spaces 
stretching  out  beneath  the  terraces  or  in  wings 

167 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

stretching  out  behind,  are  rooms  devoted  to  various 
branches  of  art  study;  for  there  are  annually  over 
twenty-four  hundred  students,  taught  by  the  best  in- 
structors and  according  to  the  most  advanced 
methods,  thus  making  the  Institute  of  great  influ- 
ence, not  only  in  Chicago  but  in  the  many  parts  of 
the  West  from  which  the  students  also  come.  The 
presence  of  so  many  students,  of  both  sexes,  adds 
an  air  of  life  and  brightness.  Scholarships  and 
prizes  give  stimulus  to  ambition  and  to  skill.  It  is 
interesting  to  watch  the  students  at  work,  in  class 
after  class;  and  one  class  were  practicing  drawing 
without  looking  at  pencil  or  paper  but  keeping  their 
eyes  fixed  intently  on  the  subject. 

The  strength  and  the  profound  influence  of  the  Art 
Institute  are  not  due  entirely  to  any  one  man. 
Therein  lies  its  enduring  power.  Not  only  are  there 
the  thousands  of  members  and  the  annual  million  of 
visitors,  but  among  its  friends  are  men  and  women 
who  have  given  with  lavish  generosity  or  have 
gathered  and  donated  important  special  collections. 
The  Eyerson  Library,  a  magnificent  collection  of 
books  on  art,  commemorates  the  name  of  its  founder, 
and  it  is  a  noble  foundation ;  and  among  other  names 
connected  with  special  collections  are  Higinbotham, 
Gunsaulus,  Blackstone  and  Nickerson,  and  Mrs. 
Field,  now  the  wife  of  the  author  of  "Meh  Lady." 
But,  though  far  from  being  a  one-man  Art  Institute, 
one  man  has  more  than  any  other  been  associated 
with  it :  Charles  L.  Hutchinson,  a  banker,  who  was 
chosen  president  of  the  Institute  in  1882,  three  years 

168 


HOW  ART  CAME  TO  CHICAGO 

after  its  founding,  and  who  has  been  president  for 
every  year  since:  president  for  two  score  consecu- 
tive years  1  His  love  for  art,  his  wide  knowledge, 
his  unwearied  devotion  to  the  interests  of  the  Insti- 
tute, his  administrative  ability,  have  been  of  im- 
mense advantage.  And  the  Art  Institute,  recogniz- 
ing this,  has  honored  him  in  a  unique  and  noble 
way. 

For  it  set  aside  one  of  the  large  exhibition  rooms 
as  the  Hutchinson  Gallery  of  Old  Masters;  and,  to 
begin  with,  it  placed  within  it  a  painting  by  one  who 
may  by  comparison  be  called  quite  a  new  master ;  a 
portrait  of  President  Hutchinson  by  Gari  Melchers. 

Around  the  room  are  ranged  paintings  of  vast  dis- 
tinction. Here  is  a  Van  Dyck,  his  Helena  Dubois ;  an 
aristocrat,  cold,  aloof,  with  collar  and  ruff.  Here 
is  a  superb  Rembrandt;  a  girl  with  tawny  reddish 
hair.  Here  is  a  Terburg,  his  " Music  Lesson,'*  with 
the  guitar  teacher  wearing  his  hat,  and  the  student 
with  a  little  velvet  sack,  with  ermine,  such  as  Ter- 
burg's  contemporary,  Vermeer,  loved  to  paint. 
Here  is  a  Franz  Hals,  a  portrait  of  his  son,  a  black- 
hatted,  chestnut-haired  young  man  with  hand  on 
hip ;  a  portrait  fascinating  in  its  richness  and  finish. 
Here  is  a  Rubens,  the  Marquis  de  Spinola ;  and  above 
armor  and  ruff  is  the  long  face  of  the  long-nosed  gen- 
eral. (One  of  the  paintings  by  Velasquez,  the  "Sur- 
render of  Breda,"  in  the  Prado  Gallery  at  Madrid, 
has  as  its  central  figure  this  same  Spinola.)  Here 
is  a  Hobbema ;  it  is  of  green  and  shadowy  mystery, 
with  mysterious  dark  trees  and  an  even  darker  pool. 

169 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

And  here  are  also  Teniers,  the  Younger,  Jan  Steen, 
Ruysdael,  and  others. 

In  a  sense,  this  collection  of  paintings  points  out 
an  odd  connection  between  Peter  the  Great,  the  fa- 
mous Czar,  and  Chicago.  (And  an  additional  touch 
is  that  Czar  Peter  was  reigning  at  the  time  when 
the  first  Frenchmen  so  long  ago  came  to  Chicago.) 
Almost  every  one  of  the  paintings  in  the  Hutchinson 
Gallery  came  from  the  Demidoff  collection.  The 
Demidoff  who  first  won  fame  and  fortune  was  a  can- 
non-maker for  Peter,  and  Peter  gave  him  rewards 
and  opportunities,  and  he  gained  ownership  of  mines 
and  became  very  wealthy  and  was  made  a  prince. 
Descendants  piled  the  fortune  still  higher  and  the  in- 
come mounted  to  over  a  million  dollars  a  year.  A 
Demidoff  of  the  middle  of  the  last  century  acquired 
a  palace  in  Florence  and  also  a  ruined  palazzo  of 
the  Medicis  to  the  northward,  at  Pratolino. 

But  changes  came;  and  in  1880  the  then  Prince 
Demidoff  sold  his  Florentine  palace  and  great  part 
of  his  collections.  But  the  pictures  which  he  most 
prized  he  would  not  sell,  but  took  with  him  to  Pra- 
tolino. Then  the  prince  died;  and  his  artistic 
prizes,  chosen  gems  of  art,  are  now  the  pictures  of 
the  Hutchinson  Gallery  of  Old  Masters. 

Lady  Randolph  Churchill  has  told,  in  her  "Remi- 
niscences," of  a  Princess  Demidoff,  living  in  Paris 
in  the  closing  years  of  the  reign  of  Napoleon  the 
Third,  who,  through  positive  orders  from  the  Czar, 
was  paid  by  her  husband,  from  whom  she  was  sep- 
arated, a  total  of  millions  of  dollars ;  which  may  at 

170 


HOW  ART  CAME  TO  CHICAGO 

least  help  to  explain  the  decline  of  Demidoff  finances. 
The  paintings  started  on  their  journey  from  the 
Medici  palazzo,  in  its  region  of  great  hills  and 
groves  of  giant  pines ;  they  came  southward  through 
that  golden  land,  past  lovely  Fiesole  and  the  hillside 
where  the  Boccaccio  tales  were  told;  they  reached 
fascinating  Florence,  whence  Demidoff  had  grimly 
retreated  with  them  into  the  wonderful  land  to  the 
northward;  from  Florence  they  came  to  Chicago: 
and  now,  ranged  about  this  gallery,  on  walls  of  mid- 
night misty  blue  with  threads  of  gold,  it  is  as  if  they 
are  to  be  companions  forever  of  the  man  whose  por- 
trait has  been  placed  beside  them. 


171 


CHAPTEE  XII 


SOME  MATTERS   OF  BUSINESS 

!  HE  Chicago  business  man  is 
a  busy  man.  He  gets  to 
work  an  hour  or  at  least 
half  an  hour  earlier  than  does 
the  business  man  of  New  York 
and  he  keeps  at  work  a  little 
later.  And  he  works  hard. 
I  remember  two  men  who, 
speaking  separately  from  each 
other,  expressed  standpoints 
oddly  alike.  "I  came  to  Chi- 
cago without  a  cent  and  I 
failed  for  a  million  dollars," 

said  one,  now  a  rich  man.  "I  came  to  Chicago  with 
ten  dollars  and  in  eight  years  had  two  million"  said 
the  other.  A  New  York  business  man  once  said  to 
me,  "I  told  my  Jap  that  I  was  going  on  a  trip  to 
Chicago."  "That's  good;  that's  good,"  said  he 
clasping  and  unclasping  his  hands.  "Why  good, 
Mahdi?"  I  asked.  "Oh,  always  good  go  to  Chi- 
cago. Always  bring  home  money  from  Chicago." 
Which  would  surprise  Chicagoans,  who  are  not  ac- 
customed to  have  visitors  take  away  money  from 
them. 

172 


SOME  MATTEES  OF  BUSINESS 

Merely  to  say  that  Chicago  works  hard,  gives  at- 
tention to  business,  and  takes  advantage  of  oppor- 
tunities, does  not  sufficiently  explain  the  city's  tre- 
mendous success.  But  Chicago  carries  these  traits 
to  their  highest  power.  And  it  exercises  swift 
originality  of  action. 

A  minister  of  the  city  preaches  a  sermon  in  which 
he  tells  what  he  would  do  if  he  had  a  million  dollars. 
A  man  with  millions  listens  and  is  impressed.  The 
million  dollars  is  given,  a  technical  school  is  estab- 
lished, the  minister  is  made  its  president:  and  Chi- 
cago and  Chicago  business  are  immensely  benefited, 
and  the  school  wins  world-wide  fame.  That  is  busi- 
ness in  Chicago.  And,  soon,  the  million  is  increased, 
which  is  also  Chicago  business. 

There  is  lavish  advertising.  In  this  it  is  the  verit- 
able home-town.  Every  magazine  and  newspaper 
in  the  East  uses  pages  and  pages  of  Chicago  adver- 
tising. Even  with  minor  advertisements  there  is 
constant  aim  at  catchiness.  "It  is  cheaper  to  buy 
good  soap  than  new  clothes."  You  see  the  appeal 
to  intelligence!  And  note  this  four-line  appeal  to 
men  who  would  fain  not  lose  time : 

"Hats  cleaned  while  you  wait. 
Hats  blocked  while  you  wait. 
Suits  pressed  while  you  wait. 
Shoes  repaired  while  you  wait. ' ' 

"Do  away  with  the  high  cost  of  charging,"  urges 
one.  *  *  Our  wagon  at  your  door  means  the  package 
is  paid  for"  says  another.  "If  it's  used  in  an  office 

173 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

we  sell  it, "  is  a  succinct  declaration ;  whereas  others 
get  at  their  ends  by  divigation,  as,  "  Whether  you 
live  on  the  Gold  Coast  or  in  the  Ghetto,  in  a  ten  dol- 
lar kitchenette  or  a  six  hundred  dollar  mansion, 
whether  you  feast  sumptuously  every  day  or  lunch 
contentedly  on  cheese  and  crackers,  this,  the  biggest 
bargain  of  the  age,  will  be  of  interest  to  you. ' ' 

Note  the  clever  brevity  of :  * '  If  you  love  her  you 
will  get  her  this  washing  machine."  And  another, 
with  something  similar  to  sell,  begins,  "That  old 
saw  about  'woman's  work  is  never  done,'  may  have 
been  true  when  Chicago  was  young.  But  conditions 
have  changed  with  our  electrical  outfits."  "From 
factory  to  feet, "  is  a  style  of  phrasing  that  the  city 
lives;  as  is  also,  "Made  by  the  mile,  sold  by  the 
yard";  and  "Tot  Shop"  is  delightful. 

Naturally,  this  is  not  a  city  for  quaint  ancientness 
of  signs:  but  even  the  signs  in  London  were  once 
new !  And  in  time  these  present  signs  will  be  ancient 
curiosities  and  people  of  the  future  will  notice,  "Bar- 
bers' grind  shop,"  and  "Manufacturers  of  creamery 
butter  and  eggs"  (the  "eggs"  arousing  thoughts!) 
and  "Song  and  hat  contest,"  with  no  explanation 
offered  of  this.  "Watch  our  window  for  your  new 
hat, "  is  of  high  excellence ;  and  the  fact  that  Chicago 
is  a  windy  city  may  explain  the  "Uncalled  for  hats 
for  sale";  and  I  thought  I  noticed  an  indication  of 
cold  winds  in  "Blue  nose  powder"  but  then  saw  that 
it  was  really  "blue  rose." 

The  "booterie"  is  rivaled  by  the  "shoe  doctor," 
but  one  would  not  have  anticipated  popularity  for 

174 


SOME  MATTERS  OF  BUSINESS 

"Le  grand  foot  parlor."  And  another  example  of 
misplaced  effort  might  be  the  altogether  delightful 
" Overstuffed  ladies'  boudoir  chairs"! 

The  feeling  for  brevity  leads  even  to  single  word 
announcements.  In  a  window  I  noticed,  with  noth- 
ing illustrative  or  explanatory,  the  one  word,  printed 
large,  "Exterminating" — a  threatening  sign!  An- 
other single  word,  in  another  place,  was  "Plugos- 
cillators."  Another  was  the  one  word  "Higglede- 
piggledy." 

The  "Palace  of  Sweets"  is  distinctively  Chi- 
cagoan.  And  in  the  way  of  music  I  noticed  a  "Su- 
preme jazz  band"  and  also  a  "Syncopating  jazz 
band" — so  that  a  choice  is  thus  offered  of  either 
kind.  "Wanted,  a  third  hand  on  bread,"  and  "A 
heat  that  beats  the  sun,"  attract  your  attention; 
and  in  "You  can  split  a  hair  four  times  with  a  razor 
sharpened  on  our  strop"  you  recognize  positive 
genius  in  the  designation  of  the  number  of  times. 

Intense  local  pride  does  not  bar  the  Paris  barber 
shop,  The  Boston  store,  the  Russian  baths,  or  the 
Connecticut  pie — which  one  sees  advertised  at 
Thanksgiving  time. 

An  advertisement  beginning,  in  big  black  type: 
"Let  the  loop-hound  buy  his  clothes  in  the  shopping 
district.  The  foxes  are  coming  down  here,"  is  suf- 
ficiently cryptic.  And  "Wanted,  trimmer  for  men's 
hats,"  would  seem  to  point  to  an  exchange  in  the 
status  of  men  and  women.  "Watch  for  your  name 
in  our  new  department  of  society  news,"  is  the  in- 
direct path  taken  by  a  newspaper  to  secure  sub- 

175 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

scribers.  And  there  is  the  real  Chicago  spirit  in  this 
declaration,  by  an  expressing  company,  "  Anything 
from  Anywhere  to  Everywhere  at  Any  Time. ' ' 

Then  you  notice,  lettered  large,  "A  different  rug 
displayed  here  every  day.  At  this  rate  it  will  take 
over  four  years  to  show  our  complete  stock.  So 
don't  wait.  Come  in  now." 

Frequently  there  is  what  may  be  termed  the 
stately  type  of  advertising,  as  "  Dress,  with  its  dawn 
in  the  dim  distance  of  the  past,  finds  its  noontide 
glow  in  the  great  retail  store  of  to-day.  Let  the 
imagination  travel  over  all  the  continents,  in  all 
climes,  tracing  all  time  from  the  early  days  of  sav- 
agery to  the  latest  period  of  civilization;  gathering 
all  art,  all  science,  all  industry ;  boiling,  compressing, 
and  condensing  them  into  a  compact  mass — and  the 
sum  of  all  is  revealed  in  this  store!" 

And  I  was  charmed,  one  day,  by  noticing  the  effect 
of  a  furniture  advertisement  in  a  Wabash  Avenue 
shop  window;  it  was  far  from  wealthy  furniture, 
quite  within  the  range  of  the  twenty-five  hundred  a 
year  man  going  housekeeping,  and  there  was  set  forth 
a  quiet-looking  dining-room  set,  with  cross-braced 
sideboard  and  cross-braced  chairs,  labeled  at  the 
footlight  spot,  " William  and  Mary,"  and  two  lovers 
were  eagerly  looking:  they  were  doing  a  little 
window-shopping  and  were  planning  their  furniture 
on  the  way  to  the  theater  or  a  "pop"  orchestra  con- 
cert, and  they  had  become  so  fascinated  by  the 
"William  and  Mary"  that  I  thought  those  must 
be  their  names;  and  they  seemed  to  be  marveling 

176 


SOME  MATTERS  OF  BUSINESS 

at   the   wonder   of   finding    them    so    opportunely. 

I  cannot  even  offer  a  suggestion  as  to  why  the  age 
of  the  men  was  specified  in  the  following :  '  'Wanted. 
Forelady  assistant.  To  take  charge  over  ma- 
chines on  young  men's  pants."  But  there  is  no 
doubt  about  the  excellent  Americanism  in  a  "Help 
Wanted"  advertisement  for  men,  inserted  by  one 
of  the  great  houses:  "The  men  must  be  American 
citizens  and  must  understand  our  language."  And 
the  man  who  advertised,  "Lost,  two  removable 
bridges,"  assuredly  had  no  reference  to  one  of  the 
city's  bascules. 

In  one  single  issue  of  a  newspaper  I  noticed  the 
following  delightful  advertisements:  "Money 
loaned  on  your  automobile  while  you  drive  it"; 
"Want  automobile  or  diamond  for  my  Chicago  real 
estate:  3  vacant  lots  on  West  59th  Street";  "Will 
trade  5  acre  farm  for  late  model  light  six  any 
make";  "Will  exchange  share  of  good  industrial 
stock  for  readymade  clothes";  "Will  accept  type- 
writer, or  what,  as  payment  on  city  lot";  the  odd 
specification  of  a  typewriter  being  more  than 
equaled  in  oddity  by  the  "or  what";  "Will  ex- 
change player  piano  for  good  used  touring  car"; 
and,  best  of  all,  is:  "Will  exchange  shotgun  and 
violin  for  electric  sweeper."  What  a  triumph  of 
utilitarianism  over  sport!  But  what  apparent 
hopelessness  in  the  idea  of  landing  not  only  a  man 
willing  to  dispose  of  a  carpet  sweeper  but  one  who 
also  wants  a  violin  and  a  shotgun ! 

A  marked  feature  of  Chicago  business  life  is  the 

177 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

fact  that  in  the  great  stores  one  sees  comparatively 
few  but  Americans,  either  as  sellers  or  customers. 
The  great  foreign  population  of  the  city  lives  and 
does  its  shopping  mainly  in  its  own  districts.  And 
perhaps  this  explains  the  pleasant  attitude  of  clerks 
in  general,  for  they  are  certainly  more  interested  in 
what  a  buyer  wants,  and  more  cheerful  and  ready 
to  please,  than  the  average  clerk  in  Eastern  cities. 

One  of  the  illustrative  Chicago  developments  is 
that  of  freight  subways.  It  was  found  that  the 
downtown  streets  were  really  quite  too  crowded,  as 
one  of  the  results  of  the  centralization  of  business 
within  the  Loop :  whereupon  came  the  idea  of  carry- 
ing material  underground,  with  the  result  that  under 
the  congested  downtown  district  there  are  over  sixty 
miles  of  tunneling,  all  with  tracks  and  electric  loco- 
motives and  trains  of  cars,  for  hauling  freight  to 
and  from  railway  stations,  for  carrying  away  rub- 
bish and  ashes,  and  earth  excavated  in  building 
operations,  and  for  delivering  coal  and  building  ma- 
terial. The  big  wholesale  and  retail  establishments, 
and  the  railway  and  freight  stations,  are  connected 
with  the  system,  and  it  lessens  amazingly  the  num- 
ber of  horses  and  motor  trucks  on  the  streets. 

It  makes  a  labyrinth,  beneath  the  busy  streets,  of 
tunnels  mostly  six  feet  wide  and  seven  and  a  half 
feet  high,  the  tops  of  the  tunnels  being  thirty- three 
feet  below  the  streets,  the  idea  being  not  to  interfere 
with  the  future  passenger  subways ;  and  the  system 
goes  under  the  Chicago  River  in  a  dozen  lines  or 
more.  Hundreds  of  thousands  of  tons  are  annually 

178 


SOME  MATTERS  OF  BUSINESS 

hauled.  There  are  three  thousand  cars  used,  each 
about  twelve  feet  long;  the  tracks  are  of  two  feet 
gauge ;  and  the  Lilliputian  dimensions  of  cars  and  of 
tunnels  add  an  odd  picturesqueness. 

Everywhere  and  constantly,  in  this  city,  one  comes 
upon  odd  business  developments.  Three  brothers 
came  here  after  the  Great  Fire.  They  looked  at  the 
reviving  town.  "  These  people  are  going  to  make 
money:  their  wives  will  buy  hats,"  they  agreed  with 
each  other;  so  they  began  with  a  millinery  store. 
Continuing,  their  question  always  was,  "What  will 
people  want?"  And  now  they  own  such  things, 
among  others,  as  restaurants,  and  hat  shops,  and 
various  shopping  places,  and  they  founded  two  pub- 
lications which  now  have  large  circulation. 

I  noticed  a  few  days  ago  some  statements  from  a 
man  of  immense  wealth  and  of  worldwide  fame. 
"No  eight-hour  day  for  any  one  who  wants  to  ad- 
vance, ' '  he  said :  and  he  added :  '  *  For  my  own  part, 
I  am  often  at  work,  at  my  house,  before  going  to  the 
office,  by  seven  in  the  morning,  busy  with  reports 
sent  out  to  me  there."  And  one  of  his  favorite 
phrases  is  that  "Luck  may  give  a  man  a  job  but 
luck  can't  make  him  hold  it."  And  he  lays  stress  on 
the  distinctive  Chicagoan  idea :  "It  is  more  import- 
ant to  pay  attention  to  the  hiring  of  office-boys  than 
of  any  other  class." 

As  an  example  of  self-confidence  I  saw  another 
Chicagoan  quoted  as  saying  that  he  could  buy  a  thing 
from  a  Jew  and  sell  it  to  a  Scotchman  at  a  profit. 
One  department  store  declares  that  there  are  days 

179 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

on  which  over  three  hundred  thousand  people  enter 
its  doors;  and  that  their  eighty-two  elevators,  on 
busy  days,  carry  more  people  in  ten  hours  than  do 
the  combined  South  Side  and  the  Metropolitan  West 
Side  railways  of  the  city  in  twenty-four  hours.  One 
day  I  came  upon  this  fine  business  motto,  soberly 
announced  by  a  great  house:  "Our  aim  is  to  do 
the  right  thing,  at  the  right  time,  in  the  right  way; 
to  recognize  no  impediments;  to  master  circum- 
stances. ' ' 

A  station  agent  at  a  little  town  begins  to  sell 
watches  by  mail.  He  is  successful  and  decides  to 
branch  out.  He  comes  to  Chicago.  Here  he  founds 
a  business,  and  it  grows :  grows  so  enormously  that, 
as  an  indication  of  it,  its  trade  publications,  mostly 
catalogues,  mount,  so  it  is  stated,  to  over  sixty-five 
million  copies  a  year,  the  catalogue  surpassing  in 
annual  output  every  other  publication,  even  the 
Bible.  Over  six  million  customers,  in  all  parts  of 
the  country  or  even  in  other  countries.  An  average 
of  one  hundred  and  eighty  thousand  orders  received 
each  day.  And  they  tell  you  such  things  as,  that  ten 
million  pairs  of  shoes  are  annually  sold,  and  ten 
million  pairs  of  stockings.  Everything  is  done  with 
marvelous  order  and  system,  by  employees  number- 
ing twelve  thousand  or  more.  Everywhere  is  an 
astonishing  quiet.  Machinery  that  almost  thinks 
has  been  invented,  for  the  handling  of  packages 
and  orders.  There  are  surroundings  of  brightness 
and  fresh  air  and  recreation  and  even  music,  and  all 
this  with  an  atmosphere  of  pleasant  but  concen- 

180 


OF   THE 
lWV!>:r"iv  Of  ILLINOIS 


SOME  MATTERS  OF  BUSINESS 

trated  work.  The  chief  executive,  a  quiet  man,  has 
a  desk  which  is  kept  extremely  bare,  for  with  him 
there  are  no  left-overs,  his  rule  being  to  decide  every 
question  at  once. 

Always,  in  this  city,  one  expects  to  find  a  touch 
of  originality:  as  with  the  highly  successful  dress- 
maker whose  question,  on  her  table  of  measure- 
ments, always  is,  not  "How  old  are  you?"  but 
"How  old  do  you  wish  to  look?" 

Here  and  there  one  sees,  in  an  advertisement  or 
upon  a  business  building,  a  declaration  such  as  "Es- 
tablished 1898,"  or  some  such  recent  year.  And  for 
a  moment  one  may  feel  amused,  contrasting  with 
such  dates  those  of  anciently  established  businesses 
of  old  cities;  and  then  comes  the  realization 
that  this  is  Chicago 's  way  of  looking  to  the  present 
and  the  future.  After  all,  a  London  house,  estab- 
lished say  in  1702,  was  once  just  a,  new  concern. 

And  yet,  it  must  not  be  thought  that  Chicagoans 
do  not  look  backward.  Leaving  the  University  Club 
one  day,  with  a  Chicago  business  man,  we  continued 
our  talk  as  we  walked  along  Michigan  Avenue.  "I 
remember,"  he  said,  continuing  some  topic  which 
he  had  himself  introduced,  "that  Long  John  Went- 
worth  told  me  that  John  Quincy  Adams  once  leaned 
across  the  aisle,  in  the  House  of  Eepresentatives, 
and  asked,  'Just  how  do  you  pronounce  that  queer- 
named  city  of  yours  f  "  And  this  reminiscence  came 
as  naturally  as  if  the  episode  of  Wentworth  and  the 
sixth  President  was  but  of  yesterday. 

The  stockyards  are  a  feature  of  enormous  magni- 

181 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

tude  in  the  business  life  of  the  city.  The  figures  are 
of  hugeness,  in  totals  of  dollars  and  of  animals. 
There  are  twenty-five  miles  of  streets  within  the 
yards,  and  three  hundred  miles  of  railway  track,  and 
seven  million  gallons  of  water  are  consumed  on  a 
hot  day. 

It  is  astonishing,  how  many  Chicagoans,  within 
the  first  five  minutes  of  acquaintance,  will  tell  a  visit- 
ing Easterner  that  they  have  never  themselves  seen 
the  stockyards  and  will  urgently  advise  him  not  to  go 
there.  It  is  the  one  thing  in  regard  to  which  Chi- 
cago is  touchy  or  peevish.  And  the  queer  thing 
about  it  is  that  there  is  nothing  to  be  ashamed  of. 

In  the  early  years  of  the  business,  when  the  loca- 
tion of  the  yards  was  then  the  distant  edge  of  the 
city,  no  use  was  made  of  by-products  and  there  were 
in  consequence  great  quantities  of  refuse  that  were 
fit  for  nothing  and  which  were  merely  thrown  out 
upon  the  prairies,  making  the  region,  to  express  it 
moderately,  most  highly  unpleasant.  And  this 
aroused  the  feeling  of  being  ashamed  of  the  stock- 
yards, as  a  region  of  dirty  undesirability,  of  awful 
and  offal  odors.  But  not  only  has  the  city  spread 
out  far  beyond  the  yards,  making  it  necessary  to  pay 
attention  to  sanitary  conditions,  but  even  without 
that  there  would  be  no  refuse  to  throw  away.  The 
by-products,  once  scorned,  long  worth  less  than 
nothing  because  they  had  to  be  carried  away,  are 
nowadays  worth  enormous  sums  of  money.  As 
some  one  has  expressed  it,  within  fifteen  minutes 
after  going  in,  a  pig  comes  out  as  hair,  sausage, 

182 


SOME  MATTERS  OF  BUSINESS 

hair-oil  and  the  binding  for  a  Bible.  By-products 
include  such  things,  to  give  a  partial  list,  as  sand- 
paper, pepsin,  isinglass,  ammonia,  feather-pillows, 
glue,  hair,  wool,  leather,  greases,  banjo-strings,  lu- 
bricating oils,  pharmaceutical  preparations,  surgical 
ligatures,  gelatine  and  of  course  oleomargarine. 
The  packers  will  tell  you  that  forty-four  per  cent, 
of  a  steer  cannot  be  sold  as  food  but  must  be  used 
in  by-products  if  at  all :  and  it  is  understood  that  the 
entire  forty-four  per  cent,  is  used. 

Most  visitors,  largely  owing  to  the  attitude  of 
Chicagoans  themselves,  go  to  Chicago  prepared  to 
criticize  the  stockyards.  They  know  that  Chi- 
cagoans shudder  about  them.  And  then  they  are 
surprised  to  find  the  yards  to  be  miles  from  the 
center  of  the  city,  in  a  direction  in  which  tourists 
have  no  temptation  to  go,  so  that  they  need  not  be 
seen  except  by  such  as  really  wish  to  see  them.  A 
question  actually  put  to  me,  recently,  in  New  York, 
by  a  highly  intelligent  acquaintance  who  is  well 
acquainted  with  the  Eastern  States  and  with  Europe, 
was,  "Is  there  really  anything  in  Chicago  but  the 
stockyards'?"  Whereas  the  stockyards  merely 
represent  an  unusually  important  branch  of  the  city's 
business,  splendidly  developed,  on  a  mighty  scale. 

The  great  covered  sheds,  with  Rembrandt-like 
effects  of  light  and  shadow,  give  an  odd  picturesque- 
ness,  as  also  do  the  rounders-up,  like  cowboys,  on 
horseback,  and  the  immense  lengths  of  covered  run- 
ways, and  buildings  rising  low  or  high,  black  or  gray 
or  some  shade  of  red,  above  the  twenty  thousand 

183 


pens  that  checker-board  the  hundreds  of  acres  of 
space.  There  are  bizarre  color  effects,  from  great 
signs,  in  red  or  black,  with  great  spaces  of  yellow; 
from  the  blackest  of  smoke,  in  eddying  clouds ;  from 
the  whitest  of  steam;  from  the  yellows  and  blues 
and  whites  of  the  long  lines  of  railway  cars;  from 
stockyard  wagons  painted  all  red  or  all  blue  or  all 
yellow  or  all  brown;  from  the  colorful  costumes  of 
the  foreign  workers;  from  the  cattle  themselves,  in 
reds  and  grays  and  blacks  and  browns.  There  is  the 
sound  of  roaring  machinery,  of  scurrying  horsemen, 
of  the  trampling  of  hoofs.  There  are  the  cries  of 
the  drivers,  urgent,  sharp,  mandatory,  the  cries  of 
the  cattle,  with  a  premonition  that  it  means  the  end, 
sounds  that  are  expostulative,  recalcitrant,  making  a 
strange  chorus.  At  times  there  rises  a  volumed  cry 
that  goes  from  runway  to  runway,  that  is  taken  up 
from  pen  to  pen,  a  dreadful,  dissonant,  swelling, 
many-throated  cry.  In  his  Pelleas  et  Melisande 
Maeterlinck  makes  one  of  the  characters  describe 
cattle  driven  toward  their  death,  saying,  ' '  They  cry 
like  lost  children ;  you  would  say  they  already  smelt 
the  butcher. ' ' 

Under  the  heading  of  business  should  properly  be 
included  the  immense  achievement  of  actually  turn- 
ing the  Chicago  Eiver  back  upon  itself,  of  absolutely 
reversing  its  course.  The  intent  has  been  twofold, 
for  the  problem  has  been  twofold.  Beginning  as  a 
matter  of  aiding  trade  movements,  it  developed  also 
into  an  enormous  solution  of  the  problem  of  sewage 
disposal. 

184 


SOME  MATTERS  OF  BUSINESS 

Joliet,  one  of  the  wonderful  Frenchmen  who  were 
here  two  centuries  and  a  half  ago,  declared  that  by 
cutting  out  and  clearing  away  where  was  then  a 
short  portage,  it  would  be  possible  to  go  by  boat 
between  the  Mississippi  and  Lake  Michigan.  And 
Joliet 's  idea  has  been  carried  out  on  a  vast 
scale. 

The  first  effort  was  made  three  quarters  of  a 
century  ago,  with  a  canal  forty  feet  wide  and  five 
feet  deep,  but  it  was  quite  inadequate,  and  in  1892 
the  present  Drainage  Canal  was  begun.  It  was 
opened  in  1900. 

The  situation  of  the  city,  at  the  bottom  of  Lake 
Michigan,  as  at  the  bottom  of  a  water-bag,  made  a 
dangerous  condition  as  to  health;  for  the  city's  gar- 
bage, although  carried  farther  and  farther  out  into 
the  lake,  was  persistently  buffeted  by  winds  and 
waves  till  it  returned;  and  the  intake  cribs  of  the 
water  department  seemed  to  have  a  special  fascina- 
tion for  it. 

The  water  bottle  could  not  be  tipped  up  and  emp- 
tied, whereupon  the  city  decided  to  cut  a  hole  in  the 
bottom.  The  Chicago  Eiver  was  to  become  an  outlet 
for  the  lake,  instead  of  the  lake  being  an  outlet  for 
the  river.  Enormously  sluice-gated  and  dammed, 
with  a  depth  of  twenty-two  feet  and  a  minimum  bot- 
tom width  of  one  hundred  and  sixty,  it  carries  away 
the  sewage,  offers  a  water-way  for  boats,  and  at  the 
same  time  is  so  constructed,  with  water  power  and 
power  stations,  as  to  generate  for  the  city  an  enor- 
mus  supply  of  electricity.  And  further  plans  are 

185 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

under  active  consideration  for  making  the  canal  still 
imore  of  an  asset  for  Chicago. 

When  it  was  first  planned  to  turn  the  river  about, 
'and  make  its  water  run  to  the  Illinois  and  the 
'Mississippi,  the  idea  attracted  amazed  attention,  and 
•one  local  versifier  wrote : 

"This  notion  surely  is  an  awful  staggerer, 
Down  to  the  Gulf  they  'd  carry  great  Niagara ! 
And,  by  forestalling  all  its  feeding  torrents, 
Made  a  dry  bridle-path  of  the  St.  Lawrence!" 

Although  the  results  have  not  been  so  marked  as 
that,  there  have  been  some  complaints  as  to  the 
lowering  of  levels  at  other  harbors  on  the  lake,  and 
as  to  the  contamination  of  river  water  for  some 
Illinois  towns,  causing  watchfulness  on  the  part  of 
the  Washington  authorities,  and  cautions  or  orders 
as  to  the  control  of  the  water:  for  necessarily  the 
reversed  river  is  now  a  controlled  stream  as  to 
quantity  of  flow. 

Swinburne,  in  some  of  his  most  brilliant  lines, 
thanks  " whatever  gods  may  be"  for,  among  other 
things,  the  fact  that  '  *  even  the  weariest  river  winds 
somewhere  safe  to  sea."  But  the  apparently  im- 
mutable laws  of  nature  are  no  bar  to  Chicago,  even 
though  versifically  expressed  by  a  Swinburne,  for 
this  " weariest  river,"  as  I  think  it  may  fairly  be 
called  from  its  past  reputation,  is  no  longer  per- 
mitted to  wind  its  way  to  the  great  inland  sea. 

By  a  delightful  chance  the  canal  ends  at  a  point 

186 


SOME  MATTERS  OF  BUSINESS 

only  a  few  miles  from  the  town  named  in  honor  of 
Joliet,  the  man  who  so  long  ago  saw  the  opportunity 
for  it.  And  the  remembrance  of  the  farsightedness 
of  Joliet,  and  the  proximity  of  the  town  named  for 
him,  bring  to  mind  the  visit  of  Harriet  Martineau 
to  Joliet  three  quarters  of  a  century  ago ;  she  knew 
it  had  been  named  for  the  explorer,  and  regretted 
that  she  found  it  called,  by  a  perversion,  Juliet,  be- 
cause, so  she  wrote  in  all  seriousness,  with  the  town 
of  Eomeo  close  by,  she  feared  that  Juliet  it  would 
remain ! 


187 


CHAPTEE  XIII 

A   MODEBN    COBSAIB 

N   a   July   afternoon   a 
little  craft  was  driving 

*Jk*M      •  •  ashore     in     a     heavy 

f  storm,  a  short  distance 
north  of  the  mouth  of 
the  Chicago  Eiver.  It 
was  a  terrific  struggle. 
Great  waves  tossed  and 
swung  the  little  boat  and 
rolled  over  it  in  torrents. 
The  beach  was  white  with 
raging  foam.  The  drag- 
ging anchor  would  not  hold.  At  length  the  vessel 
grounded ;  and  when  the  storm  died  down,  the  cap- 
tain waded  ashore  and  claimed  ownership  by  right 
of  discovery. 

This  reads  as  if  it  happened  far  back  in  the  days 
of  the  earliest  explorers,  when  discovery  still  gave 
unquestioned  title.  But  it  was  really  an  event  of 
rather  recent  years ;  for  the  claim  through  discovery 
was  made  half  a  century  after  Chicago  had  become 
an  incorporated  city ;  forty-nine  years,  if  one  would 
be  exact  in  regard  to  so  important  a  matter.  It  oc- 
curred in  1886. 

188 


A  MODERN  CORSAIR 

And  it  was  not  a  fantastic  jest  but  a  serious  mat- 
ter and  a  serious  claim,  added  to  by  other  serious 
claims  as  rapidly  as  legal  ingenuity  could  formulate 
them,  and  supported  in  time  by  rifles  and  bullets,  by 
desperate  conflicts  and  desperate  bravery. 

Nothing  so  extraordinary,  so  wild,  so  bizarre,  so 
outre,  ever  happened  in  the  history  of  any  other 
American  city.  It  was  the  perils  of  the  early  ex- 
plorers, brought  to  this  great  modern  city  in  these 
modern  times :  it  was  the  Middle  Ages ;  it  was  knight- 
errantry.  And  as  Longfellow  put  it  of  some  New 
England  celebrity,  it  is  the  more  interesting  through 
its  being  an  American  and  an  American  happening 
than  it  would  be  if  it  were  a  story  of 

"Old  Sir  William,  or  what  not, 
Clinking  about  in  foreign  lands 
With  iron  gauntlets  on  his  hands 
And  on  his  head  an  iron  pot ! ' ' 

George  Wellington  Streeter  was  one  of  the 
children  of  a  pioneer  of  the  West.  As  a  young  man 
he  served  in  the  Civil  War.  After  that  he  drifted 
about,  wandered  though  much  of  the  Western 
country,  became  acquainted  with  buffaloes  and  In- 
dians, did  steamboating  on  the  Cumberland  and  the 
Mississippi,  and  then  gravitated  to  Chicago  in  the 
late  80 's. 

He  had  been  roaming  up  and  down  the  land,  a 
knight-errant,  ready  to  fight  with  pistol  or  knife  or 
fists  with  anybody  who  wanted  to  fight:  like  those 
old-timers  who  are  so  admired  because  they  went 

189 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

about  with  sword  and  spear  looking  for  trouble. 
Streeter  was  always  looking  for  trouble,  or  at  least 
expecting  it !  He  had  fights  innumerable. 

The  summer  of  1886  found  him  operating  a  little 
steamer,  scarcely  larger  than  a  steam  launch,  with 
the  ends  of  the  deck  open  and  the  center  inclosed. 
With  this  he  made  trips  out  from  Chicago,  as  far  as 
Milwaukee  and  return.  It  looked  as  if  his  life  of  ad- 
venture had  become  a  life  of  the  commonplace.  But 
the  greatest  adventure  of  his  adventurous  life  was 
immediately  in  front  of  him. 

On  July  10  he  steamed  out  of  the  harbor  for  one 
of  his  trips  to  Milwaukee.  He  had  a  party  of 
passengers  aboard,  and  was  to  return  with  them  the 
same  day.  But  a  storm  arose,  and  so  threateningly 
increased  that  the  passengers  determined  to  return 
to  Chicago  by  rail. 

But  Streeter  was  not  daunted.  He  started  out  in 
the  growing  storm  and  managed  to  get  his  tiny 
steamer  opposite  the  harbor  of  Chicago.  But  to 
enter  the  harbor  was  another  matter.  The  gale  had 
furiously  increased.  Darkness  came,  and  found  him 
still  contesting  with  wind  and  waves,  foot  by  foot, 
inch  by  inch.  Twice  he  was  swept  overboard ;  but  he 
had  tied  a  rope  around  his  waist  and  was  dragged 
back  by  his  wife  or  by  one  of  the  crew;  the  crew 
totaling  one  or  two  men. 

Hours  passed.  The  boat  rolled  and  struggled. 
Darkness  came.  Ten  o'clock  came.  The  engine 
broke  down  and  there  was  now  sheer  helplessness. 
The  boat  struck  and  slid  and  slithered  onward.  The 

190 


A  MODEKN  COBSAIR 

seams  of  its  hull  opened.  It  grounded  again  and 
sank. 

It  was  now  three  in  the  morning  and  the  boat  was 
aground  at  a  point  four  hundred  and  fifty  feet  from 
shore :  or,  again  to  be  precise,  just  four  hundred  and 
fifty-one  feet  from  the  shore  line,  this  figure  being 
insisted  upon  in  the  legal  battles  that  were  to  come. 

He  had  landed  near  what  was  to  be  the  foot  of 
Superior  Street,  and  the  general  aspect  of  the  neigh- 
borhood suited  him  admirably.  There  were  some 
houses  at  a  little  distance  back  from  the  water,  but 
the  stretch  bordering  the  lake  was  an  uninhabited 
waste  and  he  very  soon  decided  to  become  its  inhab- 
itant. The  spot  where  his  boat  was  wrecked  was  less 
than  a  mile  from  the  mouth  of  the  river  and  from 
Rush  Street  Bridge.  It  was  unsettled  and  un- 
claimed. The  conditions  were  ideal.  For  Streeter 
was  not  the  man  to  let  anything  desirable  go  un- 
claimed if  he  had  the  right  to  claim  it. 

An  adjoining  owner — it  is  said  to  have  been  N.  K. 
Fairbank — told  him  he  might  haul  in  the  boat  and 
strengthen  its  position:  and  this  strengthened 
Streeter 's  legal  position.  Before  very  long  the  rich 
owner  asked  him  to  leave :  but  this  was  not  the  first 
time  that  an  "Old  Man  of  the  Sea"  stayed  on,  un- 
welcome, after  having  been  welcomed. 

The  claim  of  Streeter  seems  sufficiently  whimsical. 
The  treaty  of  peace  between  the  United  States  and 
Great  Britain,  so  he  set  forward  in  his  argument  for 
possession,  gave  as  the  national  boundary  a  line 
through  the  center  of  Lakes  Ontario,  Erie,  St.  Clair, 

191 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

Huron  and  Superior,  but  omitted  Lake  Michigan. 
Were  Lake  Michigan  a  little  inland  lakelet  this 
omission  would  be  of  no  importance;  but  Streeter 
declared  it  to  be  essentially  an  ocean,  requiring  to 
be  considered  and  named  in  a  treaty:  and  that  its 
omission  left  the  bordering  land  in  the  legal  situation 
of  unclaimed  territory,  and  that  therefore  his  claim 
of  possession  through  discovery  should  hold. 

Perhaps  Chicago  should  be  pardoned  for  not  quite 
following  his  logic;  perhaps  it  was  not  unreasonable 
in  being  frankly  puzzled;  but  the  assurance  of  the 
claim,  the  arrogance,  the  unexpectedness  of  it  all, 
were  fascinating. 

Streeter,  man  of  action  that  he  was  and  not  mere 
visionary,  mapped  out  his  claim  and  offered  lots  for 
sale.  Then  the  law  was  invoked,  and  a  long  series 
of  legal  struggles  was  begun. 

Streeter  did  not  confine  himself  to  the  claim  of 
discovery.  He  asserted  that  Chicago  owned  only 
through  the  rights  of  Virginia,  and  that  Virginia 
owned  only  to  the  water 's  edge.  He  would  thus  own 
everything  outside  the  technical  water's  edge:  and 
from  the  beginning  he  had  set  himself  to  the  task  of 
filling  in  land. 

The  original  claims  might  be  taken  by  his  oppo- 
nents to  be  a  sort  of  jest;  although  not  a  jest  to 
him;  but  the  matter  of  the  filled-in  land,  the  made 
land,  outside  of  the  technical  water's  edge,  could  not 
be  treated  as  a  jest  by  anybody.  The  owners  of  ad- 
joining land  soon  began  to  feel  considerable  con- 

192 


A  MODERN  CORSAIR 

cern;  and  such  bitterness  entered  into  the  contests 
that  there  was  for  a  long  period  resort  to  violence 
as  well  as  to  the  courts,  and  Streeter  was  charged  at 
one  time  or  another  with  murder,  assault,  forgery 
and  other  crimes.  When  a  warrant  was  successfully 
served,  and  he  was  marched  off  to  be  arraigned,  his 
wife  stood  guard  in  his  absence,  eye  looking  along 
rifle  barrel,  finger  on  trigger,  and  as  Streeter 's  ab- 
sences were  brief,  the  judges '  verdicts  deciding  that 
there  was  no  reason  for  holding  him,  he  would  find 
everything  safe  upon  his  return. 

His  wife,  Irish-born,  was  indeed  a  helpmate,  ready 
to  help  him  devotedly.  She  was  not  his  first  wife, 
nor  was  she  his  last — it  might  perhaps  be  said  that 
he  had  the  marrying  habit — but  she  was  his  wife  dur- 
ing the  years  when  his  need  was  for  precisely  such 
a  helper  as  she  was,  valiant  and  absolutely  devoted, 
not  only  sleeplessly  on  guard  to  aid  him  but,  woman 
though  she  was,  of  physical  fearlessness. 

He  called  his  claimed  land  the  "District  of  Lake 
Michigan, ' '  and  had  it  formally  organized,  with  legal 
ceremony,  under  this  name !  And  Chicagoans  loved 
to  go  and  look  wonderingly  at  his  Peggotty-made 
house. 

The  boat  had  settled  too  firmly  to  be  floated. 
Sand  began  to  drift  and  gather  about  it  with 
astonishing  quickness,  and  he  promptly  assisted  this 
filling-in.  Much  excavating  for  building  was  going 
on  in  the  city  and  he  arranged  with  contractors  to 
dump  refuse  stone  and  brick  at  the  edge  of  his 

193 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

claimed  tract.  They  would  dump  it  as  near  as  they 
could,  and  he  would  load  it  in  his  yawl  and  carry  it 
out  and  dispose  of  it  around  his  boat. 

Sand  gathered  more  swiftly.  By  the  end  of  No- 
vember he  was  able  to  put  jacks  under  the  boat  and 
lift  it  inch  by  inch.  It  was  the  " Toiler  of  the  Sea" 
story,  right  here  on  the  Chicago  beach;  a  tale  of 
infinite  patience,  of  skill,  of  strength,  of  tireless 
energy.  How  Hugo  would  have  loved  it ! 

He  repaired  the  cabin.  Gradually  he  got  his  boat 
three  feet  above  water.  Gradually  he  made  land 
around  it.  He  and  his  wife  prepared  to  face  winter 
there  and  its  cold  and  storms.  And,  as  it  turned 
out,  they  lived  in  this  boat  for  a  number  of  winters 
and  summers.  Often,  storms  would  wash  away  his 
piled-up  stone.  But  nothing  dismayed  him.  Al- 
ways he  was  like  Hugo's  " Toiler  of  the  Sea."  He 
worked  patiently  and  with  vast  labor  at  the  filling  in. 
Now  and  then  he  found  pieces  of  lead  or  zinc  or 
copper,  lost  wreckage,  uncovered  by  storms,  and 
sometimes  gold  or  silver  coins!  " Pieces  of  eight!" 
What  a  touch !  And  as  he  would  naively  express  it, 
he  felt  that  he  was  making  a  valuable  homestead  for 
himself ! 

It  has  been  asserted,  and  apparently  believed,  by 
some  of  his  opponents,  that  on  that  July  day  of 
storm  it  was  his  deliberate  plan  to  get  himself 
wrecked  and  driven  ashore:  but  if  that  was  so  it 
would  but  add  to  the  desperate  wonder  of  it,  the  dar- 
ing, the  intrepidity,  the  readiness  to  face  death  to 
gain  an  end. 

194 


A  MODERN  CORSAIR 

The  legal  proceedings  dragged  slowly  on.  One  of 
Streeter  's  claims,  through  some  delving  lawyer,  even 
went  back  to  some  ancient  King  Richard  law  regard- 
ing forcible  entry  and  detainer.  And  Streeter 
claimed  that  his  millionaire  opponents  were  outlaws 
trying  to  get  him  ejected  by  hired  force.  There  were 
attempts  to  catch  him  off  his  guard.  There  were 
attempts  to  get  him  into  fights,  and  as  fighting  was 
his  forte  there  would  be  grounds  for  new  warrants, 
new  arrests,  new  charges,  but  with  astonishing  ab- 
sence of  result. 

Though  the  civil  proceedings  went  loiteringly 
there  was  no  loitering  with  what  may  be  termed  the 
uncivil.  There  were  sieges  and  night  watches.  His 
principal  weapon  was  a  sawed-off  army  musket, 
which  he  often  used  as  a  club.  It  was  kept  loaded 
with  small  shot  instead  of  bullets,  for  he  had  no 
desire  to  kill.  For  several  years,  for  the  guerilla 
warfare  was  lengthy,  the  doctors  of  the  growing 
North  Side  were  busy  picking  shot  out  of  men  en- 
gaged in  the  Streeter  War. 

He  built  a  new  cabin  on  top  of  his  boat,  and  this 
Fenimore  Cooper-like  cabin  was  often  held  by  his 
wife  while  he,  like  Deerslayer,  dodged  and  watched 
and  listened  outside.  Often,  police  and  crowds  of 
people  gathered,  to  look  on,  in  anticipation  of  a 
battle. 

He  had  a  place  to  hide  his  gun  so  that  he  could  get 
it  after  an  absence  without  going  to  his  cabin.  One 
night,  getting  back  after  one  of  the  arrests  which  did 
not  hold  him,  he  suspected  an  ambuscade  and  ap- 

195 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

preached  with  in  finite  caution.  It  was  bitter  cold, 
and  he  fonnd  that  five  deputy  sheriffs  were  in  the 
boat,  laughing  and  joking  about  their  success  thus 
far  and  planning  to  get  up  into  the  cabin.  They 
sat  by  a  lamp.  He  fired  at  it  through  the  window, 
putting  them  in  darkness.  Then  he  put  a  volley  of 
small  shot  among  them.  There  were  wild  yells  and 
excitement.  They  rushed  out.  Three  he  knocked 
unconscious.  Two  escaped  but  only  by  dashing 
through  icy  water. 

Conflicts  grew  more  bitter.  He  gathered  men 
about  him.  Assailants  tried  to  burn  him  out. 
Lawyers  flocked  to  Streeter  ready  to  go  into  court 
for  the  advertisement  of  it  and  for  a  share  of  what 
they  might  gain.  The  situation  grew  more  tense 
and  savage.  A  man  was  killed.  The  situation  could 
not  continue  forever.  And  it  had  by  now  gone  into 
this  Twentieth  Century ! 

After  long  delays,  he  was  convicted  of  murder. 
His  wife  died  while  he  was  in  jail.  He  appealed, 
and  was  set  free.  But  somehow,  the  active  physical 
war  was  over  although  in  some  phases  this  Jarndyc^ 
and  Jarndyce  case  is  still  in  the  courts.  There 
seems  to  be  some  question  as  to  precisely  what 
Streeter  may  have  got  out  of  it,  but  for  a  time  he 
actually  offered  lots  for  sale  in  what  was  colloquially 
known  as  Streeterville. 

And  as  I  write  Streeter  still  lives  in  the  city  where 
he  played  out  his  story  for  years ;  and  the  land  that 
he  claimed  is  immensely  valuable,  closely  built  over 
by  those  he  fought,  laid  out  in  streets;  and  he  goes 

196 


A  MODERN  CORSAIR 

tip  and  down,  cinnamon  haired  and  cinnamon  coated, 
a  D  'Artagnan  of  Chicago. 

Going  toward  the  center  of  the  city,  through 
Lincoln  Park,  you  see  land  jutting  out  into  the  lake. 
Upon  it  rise  tall  apartment  houses,  which  seem  the 
taller  through  their  position  at  the  edge  of  the  water. 
Beyond,  you  see  the  towered  end  of  the  great  recrea- 
tion pier,  and  somehow,  in  all,  you  get  an  odd  effect 
as  of  Venice.  At  your  right,  bordering  the  park, 
are  homes  of  wealth.  It  is  charming,  this  view;  it 
is  one  of  the  striking  bits  of  Chicago ;  and  it  is  near 
where  these  big  apartment  houses  now  stand,  it 
was  here  in  the  very  atmosphere  of  wealth,  that 
Streeter  was  wrecked  and  where  was  organized  the 
"District  of  Lake  Michigan." 


fir 


197 


CHAPTER  XIV 


TEAITS  AND  ASPECTS 


^1-tiJii   word   "Chicago" 
I  has    an    electrifying 


HE   word 
an 

effect      on 
Chicagoan. 
and   stimulates, 
cago!"    It  is  a 
cry,    a   slogan,   a 


the      real 
It     rouses 
"Chi- 
battle- 
watch- 


word,  an  appeal,  a  de- 
fiance, a  boast.  ' l  Chicago 
is  Chicago.  It  is  inevit- 
able. Nothing  can  stop 
it,"  says  one  of  the  char- 
acters in  Fuller's  " Cliff  Dwellers." 

And,  following  from  absolute  confidence  in  the 
city,  comes  high  personal  confidence.  Advertise- 
ments offering  for  work  (one  does  not  say,  "asking 
for  work")  would  seem  to  show  that  all  the  most 
able  men  and  women  in  the  land  are  ready  to  work 
in  Chicago;  at  least,  taking  the  advertisers'  state- 
ments of  their  own  abilities  at  even  a  great  discount, 
the  impression  still  holds  of  the  marvelous  amount 
of  high  capacity  awaiting  the  invitation  to  highly- 
paid  work.  And  they  are  not  in  the  least  diffident 
about  declaring  that  they  must  be  well  paid.  After 

198 


TRAITS  AND  ASPECTS 

all,  it  is  a  very  old  Chicago  story,  that  the  lawyer, 
called  upon  to  settle  a  bet  as  to  who  was  the  best 
lawyer  in  the  city,  promptly  declared  that  he  him- 
self was;  and  when  asked,  by  the  embarrassed  in- 
quirer, how  this  could  be  proven  to  the  other  man, 
replied,  "You  don't  need  to  prove  it;  I  admit  it." 
(Chicagoans  "with  great  art  will  lie  on  the  watch  to 
hook  in  their  own  praise,"  to  quote  a  quaintness 
from  an  Englishman  who  wrote  before  Chicago  was 
founded.) 

It  was  another  Chicago  lawyer  who  never  talked 
ill  of  any  one — because  he  never  talked  of  any  one 
but  himself !  And  it  was  still  another  who  demanded 
the  release  of  his  client,  a  deaf  man,  on  the  ground 
that  he  had  not  had  a  hearing.  And  it  was  a  long- 
ago  lawyer  who,  receiving  from:  Horace  Greeley  an 
account  for  collection,  with  the  offer  of  half  the 
amount  for  collecting,  wrote  Greeley  after  a  while, 
"Dear  Sir,  I  have  collected  my  half,  but  your  half 
is  uncollectable  " ;  a  joke  which  Greeley  deemed  alto- 
gether too  good  to  keep  to  himself. 

Greeley,  by  the  way,  in  spite  of  his  "Go  West" 
slogan,  did  not  particularly  impress  Chicagoans 
when  he  was  in  the  city  on  political  or  other  mat- 
ters ;  they  described  him,  with  a  phrase  that  has  since 
been  often  applied  to  other  men  by  other  cities,  as 
a  self -made  man  who  worshiped  his  creator. 

Chicago  has  been  so  freely  abused  that  she  has 
felt  quite  at  liberty  to  be  critical  in  return ;  and  she 
has  kept  her  temper,  and  her  comments  have  had  a 
cutting  edge.  When  George  William  Curtis  was  an 

199 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

idol  in  the  East  he  went  to  Chicago  and  was  duly 
looked  over.  "His  profile  is  fine;  we  suppose  it 
might  be  called  classical.  The  forehead  and  nose 
are  particularly  good.  The  chin  has  a  dimple,  and 
we  have  yet  to  find  a  man  with  a  dimple  in  his  chin 
who  has  any  staying  qualities.  He  parts  his  hair 
in  the  middle,  and  that  lends  him  an  air  of  effemin- 
acy. ' '  And  in  conclusion  comes  the  terrible  insight 
of  the  summing  up;  no  one  but  a  Chicagoan  or 
Dean  Swift  could  be  so  easy  and  so  crushing: 
1 1  His  whole  appearance  is  that  of  an  overworked  con- 
fidential clerk  in  a  metropolitan  jewelry  store." 
Not  just  a  clerk,  you  notice,  but  so  very  much 
stronger  from  the  imagined  detail  of  the  jewelry 
store. 

Often  the  jibes  are  not  only  clever  but  good- 
naturedly  so.  "His  Western  trip  will  do  George  P. 
Hoar  a  power  of  good.  He  will  learn  that  the  cod- 
fish is  no  more  the  national  bird  than  baked  beans 
were  the  manna  which  heaven  showered  upon  the 
children  of  Israel  in  the  wilderness." 

And  humor  may  be  very  serious.  It  may  be  used 
to  point  an  argument  or  an  idea,  as  by  John  T. 
McCutcheon,  the  cartoonist,  the  best  in  the  world  in 
recent  years,  whose  pictures  combine  humorous 
presentation  with  a  tremendous  effectiveness. 

Chicagoans,  hard  though  they  work,  also  know 
how  to  laugh.  They  have  the  joie  de  vivre.  Their 
humor  is  likely  to  have  an  unexpected  drollness :  and 
always  it  is  distinctly  of  a  Chicago  quality.  Some 
man  is  spoken  of,  who  "was  married  twice  and  was 

200 


TEAITS  AND  ASPECTS 

Iso  in  the  war."  Or,  apropos  of  nothing  in  par- 
ticular, a  friend  will  just  happen  to  say  in  his  talk 
that  your  head  sits  upon  one  end  of  your  spinal 
column  and  that  you  sit  on  the  other.  Or  "If  that 
man  ever  gets  an  idea,  he  would  die  of  childbirth.'7 
And,  according  to  a  newspaper,  a  little  boy  calls  back 
to  his  grandfather,  "Come  on,  grandpa,  put  a  little 
more  pep  into  your  legs. ' '  And  I  remember  that  one 
evening,  in  the  ladies'  reception  room  of  one  of  the 
clubs,  a  young  woman  beside  me  asked  an  older  one, 
of  fifty  years  or  more,  "How's  your  mother?"  To 
which  the  elder  replied,  *  *  Full  of  pep ! ' ' 

The  city  has  a  few  favorite  words  and  pronuncia- 
tions. "Sure"  is  met  very  often:  and  it  is  uttered 
with  wide  variation  of  intonation,  from  friendly  to 
quarrelsome  with  indifference  in  between.  "Horn- 
ing in,"  one  of  the  most  expressive  phrases  on  the 
lips  of  man,  comes  obviously  from  a  local  source. 
The  pronunciation  of  the  Des  Plaines  River  is  al- 
ways just  as  spelled :  no  weak  yielding  to  foreign  in- 
fluence !  Halstead  Street  is  given  a  markedly  broad 
"Haul."  Devon  is  usually  "Dee-vone."  Now  and 
then  there  is  a  striving  for  the  unusual,  as,  "The 
singer  was  listened  to  by  an  abundant  and  adulant 
audience."  I  have  more  than  once  noticed  the  pro- 
nunciation of  "trait"  as  "tray";  something  to  be 
met  with,  but  rarely,  in  England ;  and  also  one  may 
hear,  as  if  in  England,  "Eafe"  for  "Ralph." 

Often  there  is  vivid  brevity  of  speech,  an  ability 
to  answer.  A  judge  sentencing  a  woman  to  ten 
years'  imprisonment  for  expressing  socialistic  views, 

201 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

added:  "You'll  be  an  old  woman  when  you  come 
out";  to  which,  turning  a  level  gaze  on  the  taunter, 
she  replied,  "Yes;  I'll  be  an  old  woman — but  I'll  see 
a  young  democracy. ' ' 

Men's  evening  clothes  are  still,  at  times,  a  subject 
of  local  jest,  although  they  are  worn  as  generally  as 
in  the  East.  The  days  when  a  rich  man  was  "backed 
into  his  dress  coat,"  as  Lorimer  delightfully  put  it, 
are  passing:  always,  "one  generation  passeth  away 
and  another  generation  cometh";  and  one  would 
scarcely  find  any  rich  Chicagoan  saying,  to-day,  as 
the  original  Armour  is  understood  to  have  growl- 
in  gly  declared,  "My  culture  is  in  my  wife's  name." 
But  one  may  refer  to  George  Ade's  wealthy  man, 
whose  "wife  or  daughter  always  had  to  go  to  his 
room  and  look  him  over  and  turn  him  around  a 
couple  of  times  before  they  dared  to  lead  him  out 
where  the  company  could  see  him."  And  it  was 
Eugene  Field  who  joyously  wrote : 

"Oh,  hand  me  down  my  spike-tail  coat 
And  reef  my  waistband  in, 
And  tie  this  necktie  round  my  throat 
And  fix  my  bosom-pin. ' ' 

The  young  men  who  "remove  their  pajamas  to 
put  on  evening  clothes"  represent  a  certain  type  of 
leisured  wealth,  not  much  in  evidence;  but  the  ab- 
sence of  an  important  theater  district  makes  for  the 
absence  from  sight  of  the  young  spender,  the  "gilded 
youth"  so  prominent  in  New  York  and  London. 

The  real  leaders  of  Chicago  society  are  people, 

202 


TEAITS  AND  ASPECTS 

mostly  of  great  wealth,  who  are  cultured,  alert  and 
intelligent,  unpretentious  and  unassuming;  even 
though  the  men  may  have  won  world-wide  fame  in 
connection  with  beef  or  banks,  soap  or  sleeping-cars. 
A  lady  described  to  me  an  afternoon  reception,  and 
wishing  me,  a  visitor,  to  know  of  it  as  a  " select" 
function,  said:  "Mrs.  B.  poured  tea,  so  nothing 
more  need  be  said!" 

There  is  much  of  a  breezy  openness  of  life;  and 
I  have  seen  women,  of  undoubted  high  standing, 
freely  and  breezily  powder  their  faces  in  public. 
I  have  seen  it  in  hotel  restaurants,  in  hotel'corridors, 
in  aisles  of  the  big  stores.  And  I  notice  in  a 
society  column  that  "if  done  daintily"  it  is  good 
form,  but  that  it  is  "very  bad  form"  if  the  woman 
should  open  a  bag  and  "display  toilet  accessories." 

One  may  find  amusement  in  reading  any  city's 
"society  notes,"  and  "hints  on  etiquette";  and  I 
quote  from  an  extremely  serious  Chicago  column 
some  advice  for  "those  people  who  desire  to  create 
an  agreeable  impression  in  the  dining  room. "  They 
are  told  to  ' '  sit  up  straight  and  a  comfortable  dis- 
tance from  the  table  (not  so  close  as  to  be  awkward, 
and  yet  near  enough  to  prevent  any  danger  of  a 
slip  'twixt  the  cup  and  the  lip)."  And,  "Don't 
put  your  elbows  on  the  table  or  toy  with  the  silver 
at  your  place.  Don't  begin  to  eat  until  all  present 
have  been  served.  Take  small  mouthfuls  and  chew 
silently.  A  well-bred  man  makes  no  more  noise 
when  he  eats  toast  than  when  he  eats  custard." 
delightfully  well-put  statement  is  followed 
203 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

by  the  admirable  directness  of  "Do  your  best  to 
keep  conversation  going,  except  when  your  mouth 
is  full." 

Women  cling  to  big  heavy  long  fur  coats;  they, 
are  freely  worn  as  late  as  April  fifteenth ;  and  above 
the  heavy  fur  coats  are  perched  little  gay  straw 
hats. 

Chicago  breakfasts  early,  lunches  promptly,  dines 
early ;  it  is  not  in  the  least  ashamed  to.  dine  at  six 
or  six-thirty;  but,  delightfully,  it  keeps  its  libraries 
open  until  ten;  it  may  eat  earlier  than  other  big 
cities  but  it  reads  later. 

Chicago  people  have  a  character  all  their  own, 
among  those  of  large  cities,  through  the  constant 
meeting  with  one  another,  in  the  shopping  district 
and  at  the  clubs ;  they  all  know  what  their  neighbors 
are  doing,  and  if  a  friend  has  a  visitor  it  quickly 
becomes  common  knowledge  what  he  does  and  says 
and  what  kind  of  person  he  is  and  whom  he  meets 
and  where  he  goes.  Boys  and  girls  still  go  to  school 
together,  and  grow  up  together,  and  use  first-names, 
and  if  anything  happens  to  anybody  it  is  talked 
over  by  everybody.  At  bottom,  this  illustrates  a 
principle  enunciated  by  Mark  Twain,  that  of  course 
people  are  more  interested  in  gossiping  about  a 
tragedy  or  scandal  or  accident  or  murder  among 
those  they  know  than  among  strangers.  Naturally, 
the  intimacy  of  life  makes  for  cliques  and  piques, 
and  the  piques  loom  easily  into  mountain  piques. 

Altogether  it  is  a  city  that  is  loved,  and  not  only 
by  its  own  folk  but  by  sojourners.  I  know  a  couple 

204 


TEAITS  AND  ASPECTS 

who  went  there  to  live,  for  business  reasons,  when 
they  were  sixty.  They  lived  there  for  three  years, 
and  found  the  big  city  like  the  little  place  they  had 
long  known,  for  they  promptly  came  to  know  many 
people,  and  everybody  was  friendly  and  everybody 
talked;  they  found  friendliness  even  in  the  atmos- 
phere of  butcher  and  baker.  The  man  works  for 
Standard  Oil  and  was  transferred  to  Cleveland, 
but  still  takes  a  Chicago  paper  that  he  and  his  wife 
may  read  the  "personal  news"  of  their  three  years' 
home.  Of  Philadelphia  it  is  said  that  no  one  can 
become  a  Philadelphian ;  that  it  is  like  being  a  Jew 
— ;one  either  is  or  isn't  one ;  but  it  is  not  that  way  in 
Chicago. 

In  short,  Chicagoans  are  f olksey  folk ;  and  there  is 
no  difficulty  in  finding  apartment  houses  that  have 
no  objections  to  children;  than  which  it  would  be 
hard  to  find  better  proof  of  folkseyness. 

Much  more  than  any  other  city,  this  is  a  place 
for  meetings :  not  lectures  by  professional  lecturers, 
such  as  Boston  so  multitudinously  loves,  but  meet- 
ings at  which  some  up-to-date  subject  is  discussed, 
with  an  up-to-date  man  or  woman  to  lead.  I  find 
that  I  noted  for  one  single  day  from  a  newspaper — 
and  just  an  ordinary  day  for  Chicago — that  there 
was  a  serious  talk  by  the  mayor  at  a  large  and  at- 
tentive gathering,  that  there  was  a  serious  talk 
in  another  hall  by  the  general  in  command  of  this 
department,  and  there  was  a  serious  talk  before  the 
Fortnightly  Club,  by  the  president  of  the  Univer- 
sity of  Chicago,  upon  conditions  in  Persia,  to  which 

205 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

country  he  had  led  a  Government  commission,  and 
that  there  were  two  or  more  important  talks  at  still 
other  places ;  and  on  the  same  day  a  great  audience 
gathered  for  the  Chicago  Orchestra. 

I  was  invited  one  evening  to  a  meeting  to  be  held 
in  a  hall  in  one  of  the  business  blocks.  I  asked  the 
elevator  man  to  let  me  out  on  the  floor  for  the  meet- 
ing. "Which  meeting  do  you  mean!"  he  asked; 
for  in  four  separate  meeting-places  in  that  building 
there  were  that  evening  to  be  meetings ! 

Chicagoans  are  good  listeners ;  and  I  first  noticed 
this  at  a  noonday  meeting  at  the  University  Club, 
when  some  two  hundred  business  and  professional 
men  gave  quiet,  steady-eyed  attention  to  an  earnest 
and  steady-eyed  speaker.  One  notices,  at  such 
meetings,  that  business  men  wear  'their  clothes  with 
much  of  an  air,  and  at  the  same  time  with  a  sort 
of  likable  or  even  almost  lolling  unconsciousness. 
And  at  any  gathering  of  Chicago's  business  men 
it  will  be  noticed  that  the  average  is  younger,  aiid 
that  there  is  more  of  baldness,  than  one  sees  in 
similar  gatherings  in  Eastern  cities. 

Chicago  is  not  always  a  good  theater  city  for 
brilliant  plays.  The  city  has  its  own  standards, 
and,  clever  though  it  is,  resents  the  cleverness  that 
is  different.  "Androcles  and  the  Lion,"  for  ex- 
ample, in  its  recent  remarkable  presentation,  was 
frankly  resented,  was  not  understood.  Indeed,  the 
best  British  actors,  as  well  as  playwrights  (not  that 
I  mean  that  Bernard  Shaw  is  British,  except 

206 


L  8n  ,tfy 
OF  THE 
UNIVERSITY  Of 


TRAITS  AND  ASPECTS 

through  his  adopting  London!)  are  rather  frowned 
upon  here:  Chicago  neither  understands  nor  likes 
the  English  accent  so  markedly  given  by  some  actors, 
and  bare  chairbacks  are  mute  but  indisputable  evi- 
dence of  Chicago's  opinion. 

There  are  two  or  three  really  admirable  theaters, 
with  charmingly  correct  exteriors ;  but  there  are  few 
first-class  plays.  Vaudeville  is  popular,  and  has  at 
least  one  highly  imposing  theater :  and  I  remember, 
on  the  night  of  the  opening,  the  awe  with  which  the 
news  was  passed  from  one  to  another  that  some 
wonderful  roses  in  the  vestibule  had  cost  ninety- 
eight  dollars  a  bunch.  If  the  cost  had  been  given 
as  one  hundred  dollars  it  would  not  have  been  nearly 
so  effective  as  the  particularity  of  ninety-eight! 
(Is  it  necessary  to  add  that  this  is  the  " largest, 
handsomest  and  costliest  theater  in  the  world!") 

If,  after  all,  some  may  think  that  this  polished 
city  still  has  something  of  a  substratum  of  raw- 
ness, it  may  be  remembered  that  it  was  but  yester- 
day that  here  were  wolves  and  wildcats  and  wilder- 
ness. And  one  thinks  of  this  when  a  huge  audience 
goes  wild  with  joy  over  a  pillow-fight  between  a  girl 
on  the  stage  and  one  of  the  orchestra;  and  I  re- 
member the  roaring  guffaws  of  thousands  when  two 
little  dwarfs  were  kicked  by  a  man  extraordinarily 
tall.  I  suppose  they  were  not  really  hurt:  but  the 
audience  would  not  have  laughed  had  they  not  taken 
the  kicking  to  be  real :  and  if  they  had  not  laughed 
the  dwarfs  would  have  no  engagements — so  it's  a 

207 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

topsy-turvy  world  after  all ;  and  the  next  day  I  saw 
the  two  tiny  dwarfs  on  the  street,  very  solemn-faced, 
walking  to  the  theater  to  be  kicked. 

Moving  pictures  are  palatially  housed,  with 
elaborate  programs ;  and  of  course  in  myriad  places 
unpalatial;  and  a  successful  form  of  advertising  is 
to  announce  that  "The  title  is  forbidden  by  the 
censor  to  be  used,"  and  a  close  second  in  popularity 
comes  from  the  sign,  "No  children  admitted. "  But 
such  deplorable  bids  are  not  used  by  the  excellently 
managed  places. 

Theaters  of  all  kinds  are  open  on  Sunday :  and  in 
this  city  it  is  not  wicked  to  have  your  hair  cut  on 
Sunday!  On  Sunday  night  shooting-galleries  are 
highly  popular.  With  quieter  folk  Sunday  is  a 
great  day  for  card-playing.  "We  had  a  little  party 
up  at  our  house  yesterday,"  is  something  said  very 
often  on  Monday.  And  Chicago  shares  with  the 
Puritan  and  the  Quaker  cities  a  love  for  Sunday 
motoring  and  a  long  game  of  golf. 

The  police,  as  in  other  cities  are,  as  a  city's 
recreation,  made  a  common  target  for  criticism: 
but,  recently,  criticism  was  quieted  for  at  least  six 
months  through  the  outspoken  declaration  of  the 
police  head  that  for  every  dishonest  policeman  there 
were  five  hundred  dishonest  citizens — which  made 
the  city  gasp  and  grow  silent. 

And  this  brings  to  mind  the  Chicagoan  who  after 
taking  a  taxi  for  a  long  drive,  found  that  he  had  no 
money  with  him.  It  was  night.  It  was  an  awkward 
situation  for  he  was  to  call  at  a  home  where  he  did 

208 


TEAITS  AND  ASPECTS 

not  want  to  borrow.  Nearing  his  destination  he 
called  to  the  driver  to  pull  up  in  front  of  a  cigar 
store.  "I  want  to  get  a  candle.  I  have  no  matches. 
I  dropped  ten  dollars  here  on  the  floor,"  he  said. 
He  went  into  the  store — and  instantly  the  taxi  went 
swiftly  away! 

Even  religion  is  not  without  its  distinctive  treat- 
ment. Rudyard  Kipling 's  susceptibilities  were 
quite  touched  by  it,  but  really,  a  city  need  not  take 
very  seriously  the  esthetic  susceptibilities  of  a  man 
who,  with  all  the  world  before  him  where  to  choose, 
established  himself  in  an  unattractive  location  at  a 
place  with  the  dreadful  name  of  Eottingdean.  To 
Kipling,  religious  treatment  in  Chicago  was  a  *  'reve- 
lation of  barbarism  complete. "  The  church  was  "a 
circus  really,"  and  the  minister,  "with  a  voice  of 
silver  and  with  imagery  borrowed  from  the  auction 
room,  built  up  for  his  hearers  a  heaven  on  the  lines 
of  the  Palmer  House,  and  set  in  the  center  of  it  a 
loud-voiced,  argumentative,  very  shrewd  creation 
that  he  called  God." 

To  those  who  know  the  quiet  decorum  of  the  thou- 
sand churches  of  Chicago,  and  the  pleasant  friendli- 
ness of  the  Sunday  golf-playing  of  a  host  of 
members,  it  will  seem  as  if  such  criticism  can  never 
have  been  even  remotely  justified :  and  yet,  after  all, 
this  is  the  city  of  "Billy"  Sunday,  who  left  the 
city's  baseball  club  to  become  the  city's  religious 
exponent — not  without  sensational  ways  and  words ! 
And  this  was  the  city  of  Dwight  L.  Moody,  the 
wonderful  shoe  clerk  who  preached  to  fifty  millions 

209 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

of  people,  a  man  of  magnetism  and  power,  of  blunt- 
ness  of  religious  method,  who  would  stop  a  stranger 
on  the  street  to  ask  him  about  his  soul.  In  his  early 
days  he  went  frequently  to  the  newspaper  offices 
to  see  about  his  notices :  and  it  is  still  told  that,  one 
evening,  a  voice  sounded  from  the  entrance  of  the 
Tribune  editorial  rooms:  "Is  Christ  among  you?" 
it  demanded.  "No,  he's  just  gone  out  to  see  a 
friend.  He'll  be  sorry  to  miss  you.  Will  you 
wait?"  There  was  a  moment's  ominous  silence. 
Then,  "Here's  a  notice  I  want  put  in."  And  he 
called  back  abruptly  from  the  door,  ' l  Christ  will  get 
you  yet!"  And  I  thought  of  this  local  story  the 
other  day  when  I  noticed,  over  the  door  of  a  Moody 
branch,  the  old-time  Moodyish  directness:  "Do 
you  want  a  friend?  Come  in!  God  loves  you." 

I  noticed  among  the  advertisements  recently  an 
example  of  what  is  proverbially  next  to  godliness: 
"Wanted,  room:  by  a  clean  man."  Brief;  it  could 
not  be  more  brief ;  yet  how  complete  it  is ! 

The  city  boasts  of  more  litigation  per  capita  than 
any  other  city  of  the  world.  It  also  claims  more 
divorces,  with  figures  ready  to  prove  the  claim,  than 
any  other  city  of  the  world:  and  a  Chicagoan  went 
before  a  committee  of  the  United  States  Senate,  in 
April  of  1920,  with  that  divorce  claim. 

In  spite  of  its  newness  it  has  become  a  mellow 
city :  and  it  would  not  tolerate  the  New  York  custom 
of  streets  torn  up  for  months  or  even  years,  with 
the  consequent  appearance  as  of  a  mining  camp. 

Making  "a  beautiful  city  on  absolute  flatness  is  a 

210 


TEAITS  AND  ASPECTS 

Chicago  triumph;  and  they  do  not  even  have  an 
island  out  in  the  lake  to  help  in  this !  But  they  have 
the  water  and  the  sky  and  a  love  of  beauty.  And 
such  things  as  lagoons  and  peninsulas  and  wooded 
slopes  and  sites  for  new  museums  are  created  in 
short  order,  in  almost  Genesis-like  quickness. 

There  are  few  things  more  agreeable  than  to  see 
Chicagoans  flocking  into  the  sporting-goods  stores, 
in  spring,  to  get  their  fishing  outfits.  Crowds  come 
thronging ;  all  sorts  of  people,  all  types.  And  with 
the  greater  number,  who  cannot  travel  to  some  dis- 
tant aristocratic  lake,  it  is  for  the  sake  of  sitting  for 
hours  on  a  pier,  soaking  an  ineffective  bait  in  the 
calm,  indifferent  water.  And,  speaking  of  fish  in 
these  parts,  I  remember  a  hotel  fountain  with  little 
fish  swimming;  and — was  it  typical? — they  were 
gold  fish! 

Chicago  regrets  not  having  a  few  places  of  his- 
torical prominence  to  show;  she  knows  that  cities 
are  expected  to  have  them — yet  she  did  not  even 
keep  Fort  Dearborn!  But,  pleasantly  predatory, 
she  took,  for  the  World 's  Fair,  "John  Brown's 
Fort,"  and  set  it  up  here,  brick  by  brick.  More 
ambitious,  and  ready  to  take  another  city's  treasure 
if  she  had  not  some  of  her  own,  she  almost  secured 
the  Old  State  House,  of  Boston! — a  shock  from, 
which  that  city  has  not  even  yet  entirely  recovered. 
Boston  had  neglected  the  building,  had  let  it  become 
shabby  and  broken  down,  and  Chicago  reached  out 
and  almost  got  it.  Not  daunted  by  failure  she  tried 
to  get  Shakespeare's  birthplace,  so  as  to  set  it  up 

211 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

here — and  only  by  a  frantic  rush  of  subscriptions, 
largely  from  Pittsburgh,  was  it  saved  for  England. 
What  next?  Who  can  say!  Possibly  the  Taj 
Mahal.  Or  the  National  Capitol  and  the  White 
House.  And  indeed,  Chicago  has  had  serious 
thoughts  of  becoming  the  capital,  there  being,  she 
thinks,  no  longer  any  reason  for  holding  to  the  now 
illogical  and  inconvenient  location  of  Washington. 

Always,  the  very  confidence  of  the  city,  as  a  city, 
makes  the  individuals  confident :  and  they  must  look 
out  for  themselves.  If  a  lamp-post  or  fence  is 
painted  there  is  likely  to  be  the  merest  casual  warn- 
ing of  " Paint."  Elevators  in  business  buildings 
and  apartment  houses,  are  not  protected,  from  the 
standpoint  of  careful  cities,  double-doors  being  prac- 
tically unknown.  'Buses,  with  passengers  on  the 
roof  seats,  run  for  a  long  distance  under  Elevated 
tracks  below  which  hang  live  electric  wires  that  are 
a  grim  menace  to  life.  Hidden  motor  cars  back  out 
swiftly  across  sidewalks,  without  even  a  warning 
honk.  And  motor  cars  are  likely  to  rush  at  you 
or  back  at  you  unexpectedly  at  crossings.  To  turn 
a  corner  without  honking  seems  the  usual  way.  In 
fact,  motoring  is  fairly  in  the  ranks  of  hunting 
sports. 

One  would  expect  certain  natural  results  from  the 
general  carelessness.  And  at  least  the  subject  of 
funerals  exercises  unexpected  fascination  for  a  city 
so  extraordinarily  alive.  Herrick's  "The  Common 
Lot"  begins  with  a  funeral.  George  Ade  writes  of 
the  man  who  "winds  up  as  the  Principal  Attrac- 

212 


TRAITS  AND  ASPECTS 

tion  at  a  daylight  Function  at  which  six  of  his  old- 
time  Friends  wear  White  Gloves.  Every  one  sends 
Flowers,  but  he  does  not  have  to  acknowledge  them.'* 
And  an  advertising  sign  that  looks  down  at  you  as 
you  sit  in  a  trolley  car  begins,  "The  spirit  of  emo- 
tion is  tenderly  woven  into  every  bouquet  from  the 
sympathetic  hands  of  a  master  florist." 

When  a  caucus  was  picking  candidates  it  came  to 
the  office  of  State  senator.  But  Springfield  seemed 
far  away  from  the  loaves  and  fishes  of  Chicago 
politics.  One  after  another  present,  offered  the 
chance,  declined  it.  "It's  a  dress-up  job  and  poor 
returns,"  expressed  the  general  feeling.  Then, 
suddenly,  came  the  winning  idea:  "Why  not  give 
it  to  Ed's  brother?  He's  got  a  silk  hat!  I  saw 
him  with  it  at  a  funeral  the  other  day." 


213 


CHAPTER  XV 


MUSIC 

HEN  Jenny 
Lind  made  her 
memorable  tour 
of  America  she  did 
not  come  to  Chicago. 
She  went  to  St. 
Louis,  Cincinnati  and 
Cleveland,  but  although 
some  thought  was  given  to 
the  idea  of  Chicago,  her 
manager,  P.  T.  Barnum, 
did  not  manage  to  get  her 
here.  After  all,  shrewd 
though  he  was,  he  was  an  Easterner  and,  like  many 
an  Easterner,  was  unable  to  discern  Chicago's 
qualities.  But  none  the  less  the  Swedish  Nightin- 
gale delightfully  associated  herself  with  this  city. 

It  was  in  1850  that  she  crossed  the  ocean;  and  in 
the  course  of  her  first  week  in  New  York  she  was 
fascinated  to  learn  that  out  in  a  new  city,  called 
Chicago,  a  thousand  miles  to  the  westward,  a  con- 
gregation of  her  fellow  countrymen  were  building  a 
church.  It  was  not  so  much  that  she  was  actually 
surprised,  for  she  knew  her  race  to  be  colonizers; 

214 


MUSIC 

she  probably  knew  that  the  Swedes  had  antedated 
William  Penn  at  Philadelphia  and  that  Swedes  had 
actually  fought  a  battle  on  American  soil  with  the 
Governor  of  New  Netherlands,  Peter  Stuyvesant. 
But  it  keenly  interested  her  to  know  of  Swedes  in 
distant  Chicago.  And  so,  in  spite  of  her  being 
lionized  and  acclaimed  as  few  men  or  women  have 
ever  been  lionized  and  acclaimed,  in  spite  of  the  ex- 
citement from  immense  throngs  struggling  to  get 
seats  to  hear  her,  in  spite  of  the  atmosphere  of 
adulation,  her  mind  dwelt  sympathetically  upon  that 
distant  congregation  of  Saint  Ansgarius,  and  she 
sent  them  a  check  for  a  thousand  dollars,  and,  what 
they  prized  still  more,  for  the  entire  country  rang 
with  her  fame,  she  sent  her  warmly  expressed  good 
wishes. 

Saint  Ansgarius  used  the  money  delightfully. 
Most,  of  course,  went  into  the  building  fund;  but  a 
large  part  was  spent  in  buying  a  silver  communion 
service.  The  building,  after  some  years,  was 
burned;  and  the  present  church  is  on  Sedgwick 
Street ;  a  structure  of  dull  red  brick,  already  threat- 
ened with  ruin,  and  not  so  attractive  nor  in  so  at- 
tractive a  neighborhood  as  one  would  like  it  to  be 
with  this  happy  association;  but  it  still  possesses, 
in  spite  of  the  perils  of  fire  and  removal,  a  chalice 
and  a  patten  engraved  with  the  name  of  Jenny  Lind, 
mementoes  of  a  charming  connection  with  one  who 
has  been  deemed  the  finest  singer  that  the  world 
has  ever  known. 

At  that  time  Chicago  had  made  no  advance  as  a 

215 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

musical  center.  Apollo,  the  God  of  Music,  did  not 
much  concern  the  city;  although  now,  as  I  have 
noticed,  there  is  great  popularity  for  Apollo,  with 
restaurants  and  cafes  and  "buffet"  bearing  his 
name,  and  a  theater  and  several  business  establish- 
ments, and  a  commandery  and  a  hall,  and  a  musical 
organization  of  high  local  standing  and  popularity, 
numbering  some  two  hundred  members.  It  is  the 
oldest  existing  English-speaking  (ought  one  to 
say  "English-singing"?)  musical  organization  in 
Chicago,  yet  even  this  was  not  formed  until  some 
score  of  years  after  the  delightful  act  of  Jenny  Lind. 
The  oldest  non-English  musical  society  dates  back  to 
1865. 

The  only  musician  who  seems  to  have  left  any 
mark  in  early  days  was  an  odd  fellow  named  Mark 
Beaubien,  who  looms  prominent  in  early  Chicago 
annals.  Born  at  Detroit,  he  witnessed,  as  a  boy, 
Hull's  surrender;  and  shortly  thereafter  went  to 
Chicago  and,  having  the  very  urge  of  rhythm  within 
him,  fiddled  for  every  party  and  every  dance.  Be- 
tween fiddlings  he  built  the  first  frame  tavern  on  the 
south  side  of  the  river  and  established  the  first 
regular  ferry;  but  such  things  were  but  minor; 
fiddling  was  his  vocation;  it  was  known  that  his 
dances  would  never  break  up  early,  for  if  a  string 
broke  he  kept  right  on,  and  if  another  broke  he  still 
kept  on,  and  in  fact  he  finished  many  a  dance  with 
a  single  string!  Year  by  year  he  kept  alive  the 
Chicago  musical  tradition.  He  had  twenty-three 
children:  he  had  fifty-three  grandchildren;  but 

216 


MUSIC 

when  the  great-grandchildren  began  to  come  along 
he  stopped  count,  as  he  expressed  it.  It  is  re- 
membered, in  particular,  that  he  once  fiddled  for  a 
great  gathering  of  Indians  and  half-breeds,  French 
and  Americans,  and  that  he  stopped  fiddling  only 
long  enough  to  sing  a  song  that  he  had  learned  at 
Detroit,  a  dolorous  song  composed  by  one  of  the 
inhabitants  to  express  the  grief  and  rage  caused 
by  the  surrender  to  the  English. 

It  was  immediately  before  the  Civil  War  that 
music  became  a  real  presence  and  influence  in 
Chicago.  For  a  man  went  there  who  had  within  him 
the  genius  (it  is  not  too  strong  a  word)  for  writing 
songs:  and  he  wrote  song  after  song  that  thrilled 
the  nation;  homely  songs  of  affection  and  feeling, 
and  war  songs.  He  wrote  songs  that  appealed  to 
the  very  fiber  of  Americanism,  and  numbers  of  them, 
known  and  loved  by  every  one  from  the  Atlantic  to 
the  Pacific,  are  still  widely  known  and  loved,  for 
they  have  within  them  the  very  spirit  of  music. 
That  composer  was  George  Frederick  Koot ;  a  man 
that  Chicago  may  well  honor.  But,  as  with  Eugene 
Field,  I  have  noticed  no  monument  to  him  in  this 
city  where  such  princely  provision  has  been  made 
for  statues  or  memorials  of  such  as  become  justly 
famous. 

Never  was  a  man  who,  in  appearance,  more  rep- 
resented the  unwarlike  than  did  this  war-song 
writer.  With  baldish  head,  and  hair  brushed 
toward  the  front  of  his  ears,  and  close-cropped 
whiskers  and  mustache  of  gray,  he  was  a  gentle, 

217 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

genial,  likable,  peaceable-looking  man ;  with  this  ef- 
fect added  to  by  the  white  bow-tie  that  he  loved. 

At  the  outbreak  of  the  Civil  War  he  wrote  "The 
First  Gun  is  Fired, ' '  but  did  not,  with  that,  get  into 
martial  stride.  Soon,  however,  came  the  unforget- 
able  "The  Battle  Cry  of  Freedom, "  and  people  and 
soldiers  everywhere  were  "Shouting  the  battle-cry 
of  Freedom."  He  also  wrote,  "Tramp,  Tramp, 
Tramp,  the  Boys  are  Marching,"  thrilling,  as  it 
does,  with  tramping  and  marching  and  war.  You 
are  ready  to  go  on  marching  forever. 

It  is  bootless  to  say  that  such  things  are  not 
"great"  music.  What,  after  all,  is  "great"  music? 
Many  a  writer  of  music  that  is  "great"  according  to 
technical  standards,  has  longed  for  fame  such  as 
that  of  Root,  who  stirred  and  moved  and  filled  with 
patriotic  enthusiasm. 

"Just  bef-ore  the  battle,  Mother,"  was  crooned  in 
thousands  and  thousands  of  homes  and  drew  tears 
from  the  eyes  of  millions.  A  nation's  liberties 
could  be  in  no  danger  so  long  as  its  public  stirred 
to  such  songs  as  those  of  Root.  And  his  war-songs 
alone  number  thirty-six.  Old  Fletcher  of  Saltoun, 
some  two  centuries  before  Root  began  his  career, 
wrote,  in  a  letter  to  the  gallant  Marquis  of  Mont- 
rose,  that  if  he  could  make  the  ballads  of  a  nation 
he  need  not  care  who  made  the  laws. 

Among  Root's  songs  of  feeling  were  such  as 
"Hazel  Dell,"  and  "We  shall  meet  but  we  shall  miss 
him," — who  does  not  know  them! — and  "There's 
music  in  the  air,"  and  such  as  these  still  live,  even 

218 


MUSIC 

though  others  of  his  have  vanished  into  the  limbo 
that  awaits  most  songs  and  other  things  in  this  for- 
getting world. 

Boston  could  have  had  Root.  Born  in  New  Eng- 
land, he  worked  his  way  through  a  musical  course  in 
Boston,  sweeping  out  the  rooms  as  one  of  his  tasks. 
Then  Boston  swept  him  out ;  or  at  least  ignored  him ; 
and  in  1859  he  settled  in  Chicago. 

Cities  are  apt  to  have  some  happening  in  their 
musical  past  which  they  would  fain  forget.  With 
Boston,  proud  of  her  standing  as  a  city  of  technically 
correct  taste  in  music,  the  blot  on  the  musical 
'scutcheon — or  at  least,  the  memory  which  arouses 
smiles — is  that  of  the  unforgetable  Peace  Jubilee, 
when  thousands  of  voices  joined  in  chorus,  to  the 
accompanying  clamor  of  an  enormous  orchestra  and 
clanging  anvils  and  firing  of  cannon!  As  to 
Chicago,  I  do  not  know  of  anything  funnier — and 
even  in  this  the  humor  was  in  the  name  rather  than 
in  the  music  itself — than  the  '  *  Chicago  Church  Choir 
Pinafore  Company ! ' ' — remindful  of  what  seems  that 
long,  long  ago  time  of  simple  days,  which  was  really 
not  so  very  many  years  ago,  when  not  only  was 
every  well-to-do  or  fairly  prominent  citizen  of 
Chicago  known  by  sight  to  practically  all,  but  when 
members  of  the  church  choirs  were  widely  known 
and  generally  talked  about:  when  Smith  the  bass 
singer  of  such  a  church  was  contrasted  with  Jones 
the  bass  of  a  rival  church,  and  when  the  acquisi- 
tion or  loss  of  a  soprano  was  matter  for  comment 
at  the  dinner  tables  of  the  city.  The  combination 

219 


of  church  choir  and  ''Pinafore"  did  not  then  seem 
so  bizarre ;  and  I  refer  to  it  because,  connected  with 
that  combination  of  churchly  seriousness  and  musi- 
cal comedy,  was  a  Chicago  singer  who  afterwards 
won  nation-wide  fame:  Jessie  Bartlett  Davis. 
Through  Gilbert  and  Sullivan  she  thus  had  the 
training  which  enabled  her  to  leave  the  church  choir 
for  the  stage,  and  before  long  she  was  singing  in 
Grand  Opera,  and  there  are  many  Chicagoans  who 
thus  remember  her. 

In  her  stage  experience,  Mrs.  Davis  sang,  among 
other  operas,  in  "Dinorah":  and  it  was  in  the 
Meyerbeer  opera  that  I  first  heard  a  Chicago  singer 
of  marvelous  voice,  Galli-Curci;  Chicagoan  by 
adoption  and  connected  with  the  city  rs  Grand  Opera. 
It  was  in  New  York :  the  Opera  company,  under  the 
leadership  of  the  late  Campanini,  having  boldly 
gone  down  there  to  show  what  Chicago  could  do. 
And  throngs  went  to  listen,  for  there  was  not  only 
Galli-Curci  but  the  wonderful  Mary  Garden  who, 
though  born  in  Scotland,  owed  to  Chicago  her  musi- 
cal cultivation :  this  being  a  Garden  naturally  culti- 
vated in  the  " Garden  City."  (Galli-Curci  had  been 
secured  in  South  America,  where  she  had  gone  to 
sing  after  being  refused  a  chance  by  the  Metro- 
politan Opera  Company  of  New  York.) 

On  that  "Dinorah"  night,  in  New  York,  the  build- 
ing was  packed,  to  hear  the  Chicago  singers  but  in 
particular  to  hear  Galli-Curci.  There  came  on  the 
stage  an  insignificant  figure,  slight,  ungraceful, 
plain-faced,  wearing  a  frock  of  dull  purple  and  a 

220 


MUSIC 

waist  of  drabbish  green.  But  such  a  voice!  Ex- 
quisite, smooth,  of  flute-like  quality:  and  how  the 
house  rose  at  her,  wild  with  joy,  hoarsely  shouting 
with  inarticulate  bravos,  with  choking  cries:  recall 
after  recall  following  the  Shadow  Dance  song,  six 
times,  eight  times,  ten,  a  dozen,  till  she  stood  before 
the  curtain  and  sang  it  once  more. 

At  home,  in  Chicago,  the  Opera  Company,  gen- 
erously endowed,  is  housed  in  the  Auditorium ;  with 
a  hall  somewhat  too  heavy  and  garish  and  too 
garishly  lighted,  beneath  the  strong  square-sided 
tower  which  gives  an  air  of  massiveness  to  the  big 
Auditorium  Building.  (Central  Church,  the  re- 
markable organization  presided  over  by  Doctor 
Gunsaulus,  technical-institute  president,  minister, 
professor,  man  of  broad  and  varied  interests,  has 
its  meetings  in  the  Auditorium,  and  there,  week 
by  week,  he  finds  time  to  deliver  earnest  Sunday 
morning  addresses;  and  there,  as  elsewhere,  I  no- 
ticed what  excellent  listeners  Chicagoans  are.) 

To  show  how  earnestly  Chicago  takes  music  I  shall 
quote  from  the  brief  reviews  of  the  various  Sunday 
afternoon  performances  of  a  single  typical  day. 
And,  incidentally,  one  may  gather  an  impression  of 
Chicago's  methods  of  criticism. 

Galli-Curci  sings,  "in  great  voice,  in  the  Audi- 
torium, which  held  its  limit."  A  pianist  plays  at 
the  Studebaker,  "putting  into  his  bill  a  queer 
haunting  thing  by  the  eerie  Erik  Satie,  whom  most 
pianists  inexplicably  snub."  Boris  Torckinsky  is  at 
the  Playhouse,  and  is  "the  kind  of  baritone  that 

221 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

gets  a  great  notice  in  the  'music  news'  "  and  "makes 
the  rain-drenched  boulevard  seem  a  better  place  than 
the  hall."  Isolde  Menges  is  at  Kimball  Hall: 
1 '  '  world  renowned, '  said  the  heralding,  although  the 
audience  had  heard  of  her  not.  She  played  the 
violin  with  a  big  rich  tone  and  with  musical  sense. ' ' 
Isadora  Duncan  appeared  somewhere  else  with  * i  six 
girls,  knuckle-kneed  and  well-nigh  naked,  who 
danced,  after  a  fashion,  while  an  accompanist  played 
Chopin."  Chicago  is  eminently  capable  of  forming 
its  own  opinions. 

There  have  been  a  number  of  well-known  Chicago 
musicians.  Eeginald  de  Koven  won  prominence  as 
a  composer  and  his  name  is  pleasantly  linked  with 
"Robin  Hood."  De  Koven 's  rich  father  wanted  to 
make  his  son  a  banker,  but  music  successfully  lured 
him.  "His  mind  was  filled  with  melody,  but  his 
hands  were  filled  with  money,"  as  Anna  Morgan, 
herself  so  completely  imbued  with  the  spirit  of 
Chicago,  expresses  it.  De  Koven  associated  him- 
self with  New  York  when  fame  began  its  promise; 
but  he  was  back  in  Chicago  when  death  came  sud- 
denly to  him. 

A  Chicagoan  who  has  remained  a  Chicagoan  is 
Fannie  Bloomfield  Zeisler;  like  many  of  the  city, 
she  was  not  born  there,  but  it  has  been  her  home 
since  she  was  two  years  old:  and  as  a  pianist  she 
has  won  fame  throughout  America  and  Europe,  and 
has  had  a  long  career. 

On  the  whole,  a  great  number  of  Chicagoan  s  love 
the  Symphony  Orchestra  more  than  they  love  any 

222 


MUSIC 

individual  musician  or  any  other  musical  organiza- 
tion. This  is  largely  due  to  the  popular  character 
of  the  movement  which  made  the  possession  of  such 
an  orchestra  possible :  for,  to  begin  with,  a  hall  was 
needed,  and  to  put  up  a  building  containing  such  a 
hall  required  nine  hundred  thousand  dollars,  where- 
upon the  sum  was  raised  by  an  extraordinarily  popu- 
lar subscription,  with  a  total  of  many  thousands  of 
contributors  of  all  classes,  who  gave  in  sums  varying 
from  ten  cents  to  twenty-five  thousand  dollars. 

Orchestra  Hall  is  on  Michigan  Avenue,  between 
Jackson  and  Adams.  It  was  finished  in  1904.  The 
Chicago  Symphony  Orchestra  was  organized  by 
Theodore  Thomas,  and  for  years  he  led  it  and  it  was 
long  known  by  his  name,  and  he  lived  long  enough 
to  be  its  conductor  for  the  first  year  of  its  life  in  this 
new  home. 

All  along,  in  buildings  nearby,  are  nooked  and 
hidden  away  clubs  and  studios  and  gathering  places 
and  studying  places  innumerable.  It  is  a  pleasant 
sight,  on,  an  orchestra  afternoon  or  evening,  to  see 
the  flow  of  people  drawn  by  the  magnet  of  the 
Orchestra  Hall  entrance. 

Endowed  though  the  organization  and  building 
are  as  a  financial  precaution  for  musical  art,  there 
is  such  demand  for  seats  as  to  make  the  orchestra, 
so  it  is  stated,  self-supporting.  Friday  afternoon 
and  Saturday  evening  are  the  usual  weekly  rule, 
during  the  long  orchestral  season;  but  Chicago  can 
absorb  even  more,  and  I  noticed,  in  one  week,  the  two 
usual  concerts,  and  one  of  the  popular  concerts, 

223 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

known  locally  and  affectionately  as  "Pops,"  and  two 
others  to  make  up  for  two  that  had  been  missed  on 
account  of  an  "influenza"  epidemic.  Five  orches- 
tra concerts,  thus,  in  one  week!  Old  Beaubien  left 
Chicago  a  grand  heritage  of  musical  endurance ! 

The  city  has  given  loyalty  to  the  successor  of  the 
honored  Thomas,  and  as  a  Chicago  newspaper  puts 
it — and  one  wonders  why  the  modestly  qualifying 
"known"  is  used! — "No  other  city  in  the  known 
world  is  in  possession  of  an  orchestra  and  a  leader 
so  good  as  Chicago's."  Always,  one  sees,  the  best 
in  the  world,  in  music  as  in  everything  else.  The 
city,  you  are  told,  makes  more  violins  than  any  other 
city  in  the  world;  similarly,  it  is  the  largest  maker 
of  drum  heads  and  of  harps;  it  has  "the  greatest 
music  house  of  the  world,"  makes  more  pipe  organs 
than  any  other  city,  and,  with  over  sixty  music  pub- 
lishers and  ninety-seven  music  schools  claims  full 
right  to  be  deemed  the  most  important  of  musical 
centers.  ' '  Sound  the  loud  cymbal ! ' ' 

If  the  orchestra  hall  gives  an  odd  impression  as 
if  the  audience  are  sitting  in  the  big  horn  of  one  of 
the  old  fashioned  phonographs,  that  is  doubtless  as 
the  city  wished  to  have  it.  And  if  the  orchestral 
music  seems  somewhat  thunderous,  especially  after 
one  has  known,  say,  the  delicate  sweetness  of  the 
Philadelphia  orchestra  under  Stokowski,  why  that 
again  is  doubtless  as  the  taste  of  Chicago  loves  to 
have  it. 

The  founder,  Theodore  Thomas,  was  born  in 
Europe  and  began  his  career  there.  It  was  a 

224 


MUSIC 

precious  memory  with  him  that  as  a  youth  he  played 
in  concerts  with  Jenny  Lind.  He  gave  up  Europe 
for  the  greater  promise  of  America,  and  was  associ- 
ated for  a  time  with  various  cities,  but  his  forceful- 
ness,  his  profound  self-confidence,  led  him  to  be- 
come a  Chicagoan.  He  loved  to  take  his  vacations 
in  the  White  Mountains,  and  he  had  a  cottage  up 
there,  and,  as  he  once  wrote,  "I  go  in  the  morning 
and  at  night  and  talk  to  my  trees  and  my  mountains 
that  I  love.  And  I  catch  a  little  bit — just  a  little 
bit — of  what  they  answer  me."  It  was  in  Chi- 
cago that  he  died,  and  his  wife  has  told  of  his  final 
words,  on  the  winter  day  in  1905  which  was  his  last. 
He  spoke  to  her,  low  and  dreamily:  "I  have  had  a 
beautiful  vision — a  beautiful — vision";  and  with 
that  the  famous  Chicagoan  died. 

As  to  Boston,  and  the  concerts  of  the  Symphony 
Orchestra  of  that  city,  one  retains  an  impression  of 
musical  students  following  the  score  in  big  black 
music  books,  and  of  more  than  a  sprinkling  of  the 
gray  haired  and  elderly.  At  the  Chicago  concerts, 
the  students  and  the  big  black  books  are  absent,  as 
are  any  marked  number  of  elderly  folk.  But  it  is 
clear  that  Chicagoans  love  music;  that  music  gives 
them  quiet  joy.  And  I  noticed,  at  these  concerts, 
what  close  listeners  the  people  of  the  city  are,  how 
absolutely  attentive.  Chicagoans  have  not  yet 
learned  either  the  pose  or  the  reality  of  supercilious- 
ness. 

If,  in  rendering  the  most  beautiful  music,  the 
orchestra  may  present  it  with  somewhat  greater  vol- 

225 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

ume  of  sound  than  the  composers  dreamed  of,  why, 
that  must  be  as  Chicago  prefers  to  have  it;  and  it 
is,  too,  not  unlike  the  way  of  the  Boston  orchestra  in. 
this  regard;  with  the  difference  that  in  Boston  the 
over-noise  is  with  the  drums,  whereas  in  Chicago  it 
is  with  the  horns:  which,  after  all,  may  be  deemed 
not  un-Chicagoan,  for  each  man  is  blowing  his  own. 


226 


CHAPTER  XVI 


WHERE   ONCE   WAS    THE   WHITE   CITY 

|  HE  first  time  that  America 
turned  out  for  an  unre- 
strained good  time  was  in  Chi- 
cago; and  that  properly  gives 
the  city  a  strong  claim  to  dis- 
tinction as  well  as  to  gratitude. 
For  America  went  happy  over  that 
special  feature  of  the  World's 
Fair,  the  Midway  Plaisance 
Mile!  (This  city  seems  naturally 
to  turn  to  Miles:  there  is  the 
Lake  Front  Mile  and  there  was 
the  Midway  Mile.) 
Where  the  Midway  flourished  is  now  a  broad 
decorous  open  space,  extending  in  front  of  a  line  of 
University  of  Chicago  buildings  that  have  been  al- 
most altogether  built  since  the  great  Fair.  Chicago 
has  a  vision  of  flooding  this  broad  Mile  into  a  long 
and  broad  lagoon,  and  of  spanning  it  with  a  few 
bridges,  and  then,  faced  by  the  fine  buildings  of  the 
university  and  bordered  by  driveways,  it  would  be 
an  unusually  beautiful  and  distinguished  feature; 
and,  as  the  city  is  in  the  habit  of  carrying  her  visions 
into  reality,  this  will  probably  be  done. 

227 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

The  oncewhile  Midway  Plaisance  is  now  part  of 
the  city's  boulevard  system  and  makes  an  admirable 
connection  between  Washington  Park  and  Jackson 
Park.  A  delightful  old  professor  stood  with  me  at 
the  entrance  of  one  of  the  university  buildings — 
he  wasn't  really  old,  but  somehow  the  environment, 
and  something  in  his  air,  gave  him  a  charming  effect 
of  age,  just  as  the  university  buildings  themselves, 
though  not  at  all  old,  give  somehow  an  air  as  of  age 
— at  any  rate,  the  professor  said  to  me,  with  a  sort 
of  prim  puzzlement  and  a  sigh — the  primness  from 
subconscious  fear  that  any  knowledge  of  the  Mid- 
way Plaisance  would  seem  unprofessorial,  and  the 
sigh  from  his  dimmed  memories  of  Midway  joyous- 
ness — he  said,  with  slow  thoughtfulness,  "I  can- 
not sufficiently  orient  myself  to  repicture  the  scene 
as  it  was  in  ninety-three." 

To  many,  it  is  the  memory  of  the  Midway  that  rep- 
resents the  Fair.  Of  course,  they  went  where  duty 
led,  and  saw  all  the  other  portions  of  the  Fair ;  but, 
with  a  host  of  people,  the  thought  of  the  Midway 
transcends  all  else,  because  no  Mile  ever  before  or 
since  gave  such  quantity  of  joy,  and  mostly  good  and 
wholesome  joy.  Whatever  there  may  have  been  that 
was  not  wholesome,  most  people  did  not  find.  Even 
the  hoochee-koochee  dancing  did  not  greatly  shock 
but  only  apprehensively  thrilled;  and  compared 
with  what  is  commonly  given  at  the  best  theaters 
nowadays  the  hoochee-koochee  seems  but  mild. 

You  look  over  the  Mile  and  it  is  vain  that  you 
ask  yourself  where  stood  the  Irish  village,  where  was 

228 


WHERE  ONCE  WAS  THE  WHITE  CITY 

this,  that  or  the  other  favorite  eating  place  ?  Where 
were  the  restless  Javanese  and  the  quiet  folk  of 
Japan?  For  the  very  atmosphere  of  foreign  lands 
was  there.  You  look  again:  for  where  were  the 
Streets  of  Cairo !  Is  even  that  locality  lost,  merged, 
altered  into  a  part  of  the  present-day  ordered  calm ! 
Where  were  the  bazaars  and  the  donkey  boys,  the 
tawny  men,  the  supercilious  camels  in  their  ungainly 
awkwardness!  And  you  think  of  the  native  pro- 
cession in  the  narrow  twisting  street,  and  the  case- 
ments, and  the  color,  and  you  remember  the  close- 
veiled  women,  and  the  swordsmen  whirling  their 
naked  blades  and  striking  and  parrying  with  danger- 
ous skill.  And  most  likely  you  too  will  sigh,  as  the 
professor  sighed,  finding  it  impossible  to  orient 
yourself  though  you  know  you  are  looking  at  the 
very  Mile  where  all  the  joyous  wonders  of  the  Mid- 
way were  wrought,  the  Mile  within  which  America 
was  taught  joyously  to  be  joyously  merry. 

The  Midway  Plaisance  was  an  offshoot.  The 
main  grounds  of  the  World's  Fair  occupied  the  huge 
extent  of  Jackson  Park;  and  Jackson  Park  is  still  a 
great  park,  looking  out  serenely  upon  Lake 
Michigan.  Within  the  park  still  stand  a  few,  a  very 
few,  of  the  buildings  of  the  " White  City,"  the 
name  given  because  of  the  white  marble  effect  of 
most  of  the  buildings,  which  effect  was  secured  by 
the  use  of  ' '  staff. ' '  The  buildings  were  planned  for 
temporary  use  only,  and  were  therefore  built  of 
temporary  materials ;  but  miracles  were  wrought  in 
the  beauties  of  architecture  and  grouping.  The 

229 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

architects  and  artists  of  America  threw  themselves 
into  the  work  with  a  wonderful  degree  of  comrade- 
ship, of  esprit  de  corps,  and  perhaps  there  was  not 
much  of  exaggeration,  even  if  there  was  exaggera- 
tion at  all,  in  the  declaration  that  it  waa  the  great- 
est getting  together  of  artists  since  the  fifteenth 
century.  And  it  is  no  exaggeration  to  say  that  the 
results  were  worthy  of  the  efforts  of  the  artists 
of  any  century. 

It  was  hard  for  the  English,  in  advance,  to  gain 
an  understanding  of  what  America  was  planning 
to  do.  The  statesmen  and  the  business  leaders  saw 
political  and  business  advantages  for  both  sides  of 
the  water,  and  warmly  entered  into  the  plans  even 
though  they  did  not  fully  understand  them ;  but  the 
class  who  deemed  themselves  " intellectuals"* were 
quite  frankly  slow  to  perceive  anything  at  all. 

What  it  meant  to  Kipling  was  that  there  was 
"some  sort  of  a  dispute  between  New  York  and 
Chicago  as  to  which  town  shall  give  an  exhibition 
of  products,  and  through  the  medium  of  their  most 
dignified  journals  the  two  cities  are  ya-hooing  and 
hi-yi-ing  at  each  other  like  opposition  newsboys." 
And  even  Wilde,  although  on  the  whole  ready  to  be 
friendly  to  things  American,  saw  but  the  oppor- 
tunity to  round  one  of  his  most  brilliant  dialogues. 
When  Lady  Caroline,  in  "A  Woman  of  No  Impor- 
tance," says  to  the  American  girl,  Miss  Worsley, 
"They  say  that  in  America  you  have  no  ruins  and 
no  curiosities,"  Mrs.  Allonby  remarks  aside,  "What 

230 


WHERE  ONCE  WAS  THE  WHITE  CITY 

nonsense!  They  have  their  mothers  and  their 
manners";  the  American  girl  responding  to  Lady 
Caroline,  says,  "The  English  aristocracy  supply  us 
with  our  curiosities,  Lady  Caroline.  They  are  sent 
over  to  us  every  summer,  and  propose  to  us  the  day 
after  they  land.  As  for  ruins,  we  are  trying  to 
build  up  something  that  will  last  longer  than  brick 
or  stone  " ;  to  which  Mrs.  Hunstanton,  with  her  ideas 
of  the  coming  World's  Fair  at  Chicago  vaguely 
awakened,  says,  "What  is  that,  dear?  Ah,  yes,  an 
iron  Exhibition,  is  it  not,  at  that  place  that  has  the 
curious  name?" 

There  was  certainly  an  exhibition,  though  not 
precisely  an  "iron"  one,  at  the  "place  with  a  curious 
name";  although,  just  in  passing,  it  might  be  re- 
marked that  the  last  man  in  the  world  to  refer  to  a 
"curious  name"  ought  to  have  been  Wilde  himself, 
whose  full  baptismal  name  was  "Oscar  Fingall 
O'Flahertie  Wills  Wilde!" 

Burnham,  an  architect  trained  in  Chicago  and 
full  of  Chicago  ideas,  was  the  moving  and  direct- 
ing spirit  of  the  structural  work;  a  post  of  vital 
importance.  He  could  plan,  he  could  arrange  co- 
ordination, he  could  bring  things  to  pass.  Yet  not 
with  him  originated  the  designs  of  pure  beauty. 
His  buildings  in  the  business  district  of  the  city, 
such  as  the  Eookery,  and  the  Masonic  Temple, 
would  alone  show  that.  But  he  was  a  big  man,  with 
big  ideas,  and  he  was  a  splendid  executive. 

One  goes  to  Jackson  Park  as  to  a  scene  of  achieve- 

231 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

ment,  a  place  of  memories.  Of  the  few  build- 
ings of  the  Fair  still  standing,  highly  worth 
while  is  La  Eabida,  the  reproduction  of  the  convent 
so  intimately  connected  with  the  success  of 
Columbus;  and  perhaps,  for  the  newer  generation, 
it  should  be  mentioned  that  the  World's  Fair, 
although  held  in  eighteen  hundred  and  ninety-three, 
instead  of  ninety-two,  was  to  celebrate  the  four 
hundredth  anniversary  of  the  discovery  of  America. 

Who,  that  saw  it  at  the  time  of  the  Fair,  will  for- 
get La  Babida,  with  its  white  walls  and  red  roofs, 
its  long  cool  arcadcd  cloister-like  walks,  and  the 
monks'  benches!  Who  can  forget  its  atmosphere, 
so  dreamy  and  peaceful,  so  restful!  To  hundreds 
of  thousands  it  gave  a  thrill.  It  meant  foreign 
travel,  it  meant  the  magic  and  mystery  of  foreign 
lands:  not,  as  with  the  Midway,  the  gayety  and 
glitter,  but  the  sweet  nne  intimacies  of  one 's  dreams. 

La  Eabida  stands  on  a  point  of  land  between 
the  lake  and  a  broad  lagoon.  It  should  be  seen, 
for  the  best  effect,  at  the  present  time,  from  the  op- 
posite side  of  the  broad  entrance  to  the  lagoon  and 
a  point  a  little  to  the  east.  And  it  is  best  seen  as 
evening  is  close  hovering  on  the  very  fringe  of  dark. 
You  see  a  little  mass  of  building,  with  an  odd  little 
tower,  and  with  all  the  proportions  just  the  right 
proportions.  It  is  as  if  "Made  in  Spain"  were 
plainly  upon  the  building's  architectural  face.  On 
one  side  the  darkened  water  of  the  lagoon,  on  the 
other  massed  trees  standing  close,  with  other  trees 
stretching  dimly  into  the  distances  along  the  shore, 

232 


LIBRARY 

OF  THE 

UNIVERSITY  OF  ILLINOIS 


WHERE  ONCE  WAS  THE  WHITE  CITY 

and  with  the  water  of  the  lake  whispering  and  lisp- 
ing in  loveliness.  It  is  lonely  there  now,  for  the 
building  is  unused  and  closed. 

The  great  and  sweeping  waters  of  the  lake,  upon 
which  Jackson  Park  looks  out,  and  the  lagoons  and 
inlets  within  the  bounds  of  the  park,  are  reminders 
of  the  superb  use  of  water  effects  at  the  World's 
Fair.  And  the  well-remembered  Statue  of  the  Re- 
public is  here:  not  the  original,  which  was  of 
temporary  materials,  but  a  costly  permanent  repro- 
duction. During  the  Fair  this  statue  won  the  name 
of  "Big  Mary/'  so  stodgy,  so  graceless  and  stiff,  so 
heavy,  was  she ;  and  the  Irish  policemen  of  the  park 
— for  Chicago  remains  so  much  of  an  American  city 
as  to  have  Irish  policemen  much  in  evidence ! 
— still  casually  retain  the  name,  not  as  criticism 
but  merely  as  the  natural  appellation.  The  statue 
is  now  of  bronze,  and  is  covered  with  gold  leaf,  and 
the  great  pedestal  on  which  she  stands  is  of  solid 
granite,  and  the  total  cost  was  a  huge  sum. 

Thackeray  wrote  some  lines  on  a  World's  Fair  of 
long,  long  ago,  and  referred  among  other  things  to 
the  statuary: 

"There's  statues  bright 

Of  marble  white, 

Of  silver  and  of  copper; 

And  some  in  zinc, 

And  some,  I  think, 

That  isn't  over  proper." 

But  the  statuary  was  mostly  proper  enough  at 

233 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

Chicago,  and  this  statue  of  the  Bepublic,  as  one  may 
see,  was  eminently  and  stoutly  respectable. 

But  what  an  opportunity  the  city  has  missed! 
— this  city,  with  its  great  legacy  of  an  income  that 
must  be  devoted  to  sculpture.  For  there  could  have 
been,  instead  of  "Mary"  with  the  uplifted  arms,  to 
commemorate  the  Fair  permanently,  a  perpetuation 
of  the  Lady  of  the  Chair;  that  wonderful  Mac- 
Monnies  fountain,  at  the  Fair,  of  which  St. 
Gaudens,  writing  long  afterwards  and  thus  express- 
ing his  sober  estimate  of  the  work  of  a  great  rival 
and  friend,  said  that  it  was  "'the  most  beautiful 
conception  of  a  fountain,  of  modern  times,  west  of 
the  Caspian  Mountains"  (was  there  ever  so  queer 
a  reservation!) ;  it  was  to  St.  Gaudens,  "the  glorifi- 
cation of  youth,  cheerfulness,  and  the  American 
spirit."  What  a  pose  the  Lady  of  the  Chair  had! 
How  splendidly  she  sat  there!  And  such  acces- 
sories ! — the  water  and  the  boat,  the  rowing  maidens. 
And  that  thing  of  beauty  could  have  been  a  joy  for- 
ever for  Chicago.  But  the  city  let  it  go :  perpetuat- 
ing instead  this  other  statue. 

Even  more  than  on  the  Midway  one  wonders,  go- 
ing about  in  Jackson  Park,  where  the  once  familiar 
buildings  stood.  They  were  somewhere  within  this 
great  acreage  with  its  mile  and  a  half  of  lake  front- 
age, a  space  now  thick  with  trees  and  shrubs  and 
paths  and  drives  and  water. 

Bordering  the  park  on  the  Stony  Island  Avenue 
side  is  a  great  long  grassy  pathway,  an  cdlee  verte, 
such  as  one  sees  in  great  French  parks  or  forests ; 

234 


a  long  grassy  way  between  two  parallel  lines  of  tall 
Carolina  poplars  of  the  height  of  eighty  feet  or 
so;  and — best  seen  from  the  corner  where  the  "L" 
ends — this  allee  verte,  this  tall-bordered,  green- 
grassed  way,  stretches  into  the  distance  on  either 
hand,  with  an  effect  distinguished  and  beautiful. 

Wooded  Island  still  retains  that  World's  Fair 
name.  And  as  you  go  into  the  park,  from  the  "L" 
station,  and  look  across  the  water  at  Wooded  Island, 
it  is  a  Corot-like  view,  with  thick  shrubbery  along 
the  edge  of  the  dark  water,  and  with  Lombardy 
poplars,  in  groups  and  singly,  standing  straight  or 
leaning  out  above  the  lagoon. 

Tucked  away  on  Wooded  Island  is  " Cokey."  So 
at  least  it  is  commonly  pronounced ;  but  it  is  really 
Cahokia  Court-House,  the  first  court-house  built 
within  the  present  limits  of  Illinois.  It  was  carried 
here  from  its  original  location  in  the  southern  part 
of  the  State,  and  here  set  up.  One  feels  some  dis- 
appointment in  the  practical  result.  But  it  repre- 
sents an  effort  to  secure  and  retain  what  was  left 
of  a  building  which  represents  early  Illinois  history. 
This  little  building  was  successively  the  seat  of  local 
government  of  French  and  British  and  Americans, 
and  it  was  built  in  the  year  1716.  Why,  the  "  Grand 
Monarch, "  Louis  the  Fourteenth,  died  but  the  year 
before!  How  it  sets  us  back  into  the  very  atmos- 
phere of  the  past ! — for  the  time  of  Louis  the  Four- 
teenth seems  long  ago  even  to  France.  And  a  watch- 
ful policeman,  for  it  is  all  loneliness  here  on  Wooded 
Island,  obligingly  finds  the  key  and  opens  the  little 

235 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

old  court-house  for  you;  and,  seeing  that  you  are 
interested  in  the  unusual,  begins,  somewhat  hesitant, 
to  tell  you  something  of  the  migratory  birds  that  he 
has  seen  here ;  on  Wooded  Island  he  has  been  study- 
ing them,  and  he  is  full  of  briefly-expressed  lore 
of  scarlet  tanager  and  oriole,  of  robin  and  red- 
winged  blackbird ;  and  he  swiftly  tells  of  wading  and 
water  birds;  an  unusual  policeman. 

You  start  to  leave  Wooded  Island;  and  where, 
you  again  ask  yourself,  did  the  great  buildings 
stand?  Where,  even,  was  the  wonderful  Court  of 
Honor?  And  again  there  comes  the  versification 
of  Thackeray,  of  three  quarters  of  a  century  ago, 
about  the  English  fair: 

"With  conscious  proide 

I  stud  inside 

And  look'd  the  "World's  Great  Fair  in, 

Until  me  sight 

Was  dazzled  quite, 

And  couldn't  see  for  starin'." 

But  in  what  direction  ought  you  now  to  stare? 
Then,  through  the  trees,  you  catch  sight  of  a  dome, 
and  you  walk  swiftly  toward  it,  and  part  by  part 
a  glorious  building  comes  into  view  as  if  rising 
from  the  past;  a  building  of  pure  classic,  the  only 
building  remaining  of  those  which  gave  the  dis- 
tinctive name  of  the  " White  City." 

"Say  not,  'Greece  is  no  more,' 

Greece  flowers  anew  and  all  her  temples  soar." 

236 


WHERE  OXCE  WAS  THE  WHITE  CITY 

Thus  Richard  Watson  Gilder,  Easterner  and  New 
Yorker  though  he  was,  expressed  his  admiration 
of  the  superbly  beautiful  triumphs  of  the  Fair ;  and, 
of  all  of  those  triumphs,  this  remaining  one  most 
fully  justifies  his  lines,  for  it  so  fully  represents 
the  noble  beauties  of  Grecian  architecture. 

This  great  building  was  preserved  in  order  to 
hold  the  collections  of  the  Field  Museum;  but  the 
completion  of  the  great  new  museum  structure  on 
the  Lake  Front,  in  Grant  Park,  seems  to  render  this 
World's  Fair  memento,  this  oncewhile  Fine  Arts 
Building,  of  no  further  practical  use,  and  it  is  set 
down  for  early  destruction. 

Even  while  used  by  the  Field  Museum  the  build- 
ing was  permitted  to  go  gradually  into  a  tragically 
ruinous  state,  with  great  fragments  of  "staff" 
flaking  off.  To  come  upon  it,  lonely  and  still  lovely, 
seen  across  a  great  lagoon,  is  deeply  impressive; 
and  it  is  affecting  to  see  so  much  of  beauty  going 
drearily  to  final  loss. 

In  splendid  center  and  wings,  in  pillars  and 
pilasters,  in  pediments  and  dome,  it  is  the  very  joy 
of  architecture.  It  is  a  larger  temple  of  Paestum, 
here  in  Chicago.  Paestum  is  of  stuccoed  stone,  and 
this  Fine  Arts  Building  is  of  plastered  wood, 
Paestum  was  permanent  and  this  "White  City" 
impermanent — yet  after  all,  what  do  permanency 
and  impermanency  mean!  For  the  Greek  temples 
of  Paestum,  set  up,  twenty-five  centuries  ago,  between 
snow-capped  mountains  and  summer  sea,  and  this 
Greek  temple  of  Chicago,  set  up  not  much  more  than 

237 


THE  BOOK  OP  CHICAGO 

twenty-five  years  ago,  and  now  sleeping  over  the 
wimpling  water  of  the  lagoon,  are  alike  in  ruins. 

The  "White  City"  was  a  dream,  and  dreams  must 
fade.     Those  wonderful  creations  of  beauty 

"Are  melted  into  air,  into  thin  air: 

And,  like  the  baseless  fabric  of  this  vision, 

The  cloud-capp'd  towers,  the  gorgeous  palaces, 

The  solemn  temples — shall  dissolve, 

And,  like  this  insubstantial  pageant  faded, 

Leave  not  a  rack  behind." 


CHAPTER  XVII 


AN    OXFORD    OF   THE   WEST 

LEVELAND 

holds  the  formal 
monument        to 
John  D.  Rocke- 
feller, set  up  by 
himself       years 
ago.    But  Chicago  holds 
his    finer    and    greater 
monument,    also    set   up 
by    himself    years    ago. 
The     Cleveland     monu- 
ment is  a  monolith.    The 
Chicago     monument     is 
the  University  of  Chicago. 

It  was  in  Cleveland  that  his  business  life  began 
and  where  for  years  he  made  his  home.  So  he 
chose  that  city  for  his  monolith,  and  it  is  understood 
to  be  the  tallest  monolith  in  America,  with  the  excep- 
tion of  the  so-called  Cleopatra's  Needle,  in  New 
York;  which  hieroglyphic-covered  stone  was  really 
put  up  some  sixteen  hundred  years  before  the  time 
of  Cleopatra,  with  the  intent  to  keep  forever  alive 
the  memory  of  an  up-country  ruler  named  Thotmes, 
long  since  forgotten  except  when  some  one  casually 

239 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

remarks  that  the  Needle  was  his,  after  all:  and  if 
Eockefeller  would  but  cover  his  own  monolith  with 
a  genuine  history  of  his  own  money-making,  it 
would  undoubtedly  be  preserved  and  studied  for  as 
long  a  time  as  the  three  thousand  and  five  hundred 
year  monument  now  in  Central  Park. 

To  be  the  founder  of  a  university  is  to  seek  for 
another  kind  of  fame  than  the  monolithic.  And  the 
founder  of  the  University  of  Chicago  sought  for  that 
fame,  with  the  aid  of  his  mighty  wealth,  and  a  great 
deal  of  personal  attention.  Yet  there  must  neces- 
sarily be  something  of  the  casual  about  the  estab- 
lishment of  an  institution  by  a  man  of  many  mil- 
lions. And  so  it  was  in  Chicago.  It  was  like  Cole- 
ridge 's  Kubla  Khan :  the  University  of  Chicago  was 
"decreed."  But  it  was  a  stately  pleasure  house 
that  Kubla  decreed,  whereas  here  was  decreed  a 
series  of  stately  Oxford-like  structures.  At  the 
beginning,  indeed,  the  buildings  were  not  Oxford- 
like;  the  first  few  were  quite  ordinary  in  design; 
but  the  idea  of  following  the  ancient  English  uni- 
versity style  was  soon  adopted  and  now  the  entire 
effect  is  akin  to  that  of  Oxford.  The  buildings  are 
of  dignity  and  distinction,  they  are  of  a  high  degree 
of  beauty,  and  although  the  look  of  venerable  age 
has  not  yet  come,  it  will  come  in  time,  as  Chicagoans 
smilingly  declare,  and  meanwhile  it  has  actually 
come  in  surprising  degree  even  within  these  few 
years,  owing  largely,  no  doubt,  to  the  drifting  smoke 
clouds  of  the  city,  and  largely  to  the  kind  of  stone 
used,  and  no  doubt  in  considerable  degree  to  the 

240 


AN  OXFOED  OF  THE  WEST 

subconscious  effect,  upon  the  mind,  of  a  group  of 
buildings,  of  ancient  and  stately  style. 

Although  Eockefeller  was  the  founder  of  the  uni- 
versity, the  one  whose  fiat  caused  it  to  exist,  it 
would  not  have  had  successful  existence  without 
the  cordial  cooperation  of  Chicago.  He  gave  great 
sums  of  money,  but  citizens  of  Chicago  also  gave 
with  a  fine  liberality.  He  gave  in  all  more  than 
thirty  millions  of  dollars.  More  than  ten  millions 
of  dollars  was  contributed  by  others,  and  in  the  list 
of  donors  may  be  noticed  such  names  as  Ryerson, 
Noyes,  Cobb,  Hutchinson,  Field,  Elaine,  Williams, 
Culver  and  Yerkes.  Not  a  one-man  university, 
this,  for  the  total  of  contributors  reaches  to  more 
than  ten  thousand !  Ten  thousand  givers,  some  few 
giving  a  million  dollars  or  more  each,  with  their 
total  of  more  than  ten  millions,  properly  lifts  the 
university  quite  out  of  the  one-man  class.  And, 
more  than  that,  there  was  the  enthusiasm  of  the  en- 
tire city  behind  it. 

After  all,  it  was  the  taking  up  again,  and  carry- 
ing on,  of  a  distinctively  Chicago  institution,  the 
University  of  Chicago  that  had  been  founded  by 
Stephen  A.  Douglas  in  the  Civil  War  period,  and 
which,  after  a  hard  fight  financially,  had  ceased  to 
exist  less  than  five  years  before  Rockefeller  founded 
the  new  University  of  Chicago. 

The  founder  naturally  exercised  a  great  deal  of 
control  in  essentials,  but  at  the  same  time  showed 
restraint.  Had  he  so  desired,  he  could  have  given 
his  own  name  to  the  University,  but  this  he  de- 

241 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

clined.  But  he  did  not  forbid  the  use  of  his  name 
as  founder,  upon  the  university  seal;  though  he 
may  have  been  somewhat  surprised  by  the  form  that 
it  was  given  by  Latinization :  "A  Johanne  Davi- 
son  Rockefeller  Fundatae":  and  he  ought  to  be 
pardoned  should  he  wonder  why  two-thirds  of  his 
name  was  left  untouched,  with  one-third  given  the 
odd  twist  of  "Johanne,'7  and  it  is  possible  that  he 
was  mildly  surprised  by  the  "A."  However,  what 
really  suffered,  on  the  seal,  was  the  name  of  the 
university,  made  over,  as  it  was,  into,  * l  Universitatis 
Chicaginiensis ' ' ;  than  which  ingenuity  could  go  no 
further.  "Bless  thee,  Bottom!  Bless  thee!  thou 
art  translated." 

More  impressive  than  the  seal  is  the  University 
"yell,"  with  its  plain  recognition  of  Chicago  and 
even  of  the  "go"  in  Chicago: 


' '  CM-ca-go,  Chi-ca-go ! 
Chi-ca-go— Go!" 


That  the  president  and  a  majority  of  the  trustees 
must  always  be  Baptist  came  not  only  through  the 
desire  of  the  founder,  himself  a  Baptist,  to  seize 
the  chance  of  strengthening  his  own  churchly 
denomination,  but  because  he  worked  with  a 
Baptist  organization  in  the  founding,  and  also  be- 
cause the  original  university  of  Senator  Douglas 
was  a  Baptist  institution.  But  the  fact  that  the 
big  new  institution  was  so  distinctively  Baptist  in 
its  control  did  not  check  the  enthusiasm  of  Chicago, 
for  among  the  ten  thousand  financially  active  sup- 

242 


AN  OXFORD  OF  THE  WEST 

porters  may  be  noted  the  names  of  people  of  every 
shade  of  belief.  Nor  was  generous  giving  checked 
by  the  knowledge  that  the  credit  was  likely  to  go 
almost  together,  in  popular  belief,  to  a  man  who 
was  not  even  a  Chicagoan. 

Even  after  the  university  had  been  decided  upon 
there  was  some  question  as  to  the  best  city  for  it. 
Nor  did  the  founder  have  any  occasion  to  regret 
his  decision  in  favor  of  Chicago,  for,  as  he  expressed 
it  in  an  address  at  the  university: 

"It  is  due  to  you  of  Chicago,  to  your  enterprising 
business  men,  to  your  public-spirited  men,  to  say 
that  in  no  other  city  on  this  continent,  in  no  other 
city  in  the  round  world,  could  there  have  been  ac- 
complished what  you  have  accomplished."  And  he 
made  the  altogether  delightful  declaration:  "I 
am  profoundly  thankful  that  I  had  anything  to  do 
with  this  affair.  The  good  Lord  gave  me  the  money, 
and  how  could  I  withhold  it  from  Chicago?"  And 
it  should  be  understood  that  it  is  customary  for 
Eockefeller  to  speak  familiarly  of  the  Lord,  as  of 
a  very  real  personage;  and  this  is  remindful  of  a 
story  told,  by  one  of  his  most  trusted  lieutenants, 
at  a  recent  dinner  given  in  honor  of  the  fiftieth 
anniversary  of  the  founding  of  Standard  Oil.  It 
seems  that  Eockefeller  had  been  called  upon  to  help 
some  new  hospital,  and  that  he  noticed  that  no  provi- 
sion had  been  made  for  its  upkeep,  but  only  for  the 
starting,  and  upon  being  told  that  it  was  expected 
that  the  Lord  would  see  to  that,  he  replied,  dryly: 
" Possibly:  but  the  Lord  is  very  busy:  I  think  we 

243 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

had  better  provide  a  fund. ' '  And  he  assuredly  fol- 
lowed this  principle  in  providing  a  fund  for  the  Uni- 
versity of  Chicago. 

The  broad-mindedness  of  Chicago,  the  public- 
spiritedness,  the  mutual  friendliness,  the  absence  of 
destructive  rivalry,  the  steadiness  of  the  city,  are 
shown  by  the  fact  that  the  president  of  the  board 
of  trustees  has  held  the  post  since  1892,  that  the 
vice-president  has  held  his  place  since  1894,  and 
that  the  first  treasurer  of  the  board,  selected  in  1890, 
still  retains  the  position. 

The  first  president  of  the  university  held  the 
presidency  until  his  death.  He  has  been  described 
as  a  steam-engine  in  trousers,  for  never  was  a  man 
more  full  of  energy :  and  it  might  be  suggested  that 
instead  of  being  a  steam-engine,  he  was  an  example 
of  perpetual  motion.  To  build  up  a  great  univer- 
sity in  Chicago  involved  immense  difficulties,  in  get- 
ting pupils,  in  getting  professors  of  the  proper 
standing,  in  getting  the  entire  project  set  forth  to 
the  world  with  the  necessary  importance.  The  city 
was  setting  out  not  only  to  rival  Western  colleges 
but  to  put  itself  abreast  of  Yale  and  Harvard  and 
Princeton,  and  it  was  imperative  that  a  man  of  im- 
mense organizing  power  be  in  charge.  The  very 
fact  that  huge  sums  of  money  were  behind  the  pro- 
ject made  the  selection  the  more  difficult.  William 
E.  Harper  was  the  man  whom  Rockefeller  chose; 
and  even  the  most  severe  critics  of  the  oil  magnate 
have  never  questioned  his  ability  to  pick  men.  In 
this  case  he  needed  one  with  all  the  characteristics 

244 


AN  OXFORD  OF  THE  WEST 

of  a  masterful,  driving,  far-sighted  business  leader, 
who  at  the  same  time  must  be  of  high  and  recognized 
standing  for  scholarship.  It  was  a  seemingly  impos- 
sible combination  of  qualities,  but  Harper  possessed 
them,  and  Rockefeller  recognized  them. 

And  Harper  had  the  glorious  asset  of  what,  for  a 
university  president,  was  youth.  He  was  but  thirty- 
five  years  of  age  when  he  became  the  president  of 
the  unformed  institution.  He  was  a  man  of  pre- 
cocious success.  He  had  entered  a  country  college 
at  the  age  of  ten.  When  he  was  only  nineteen  he 
was  given  the  degree  of  Doctor  of  Philosophy  by 
Yale  University.  He  rapidly  made  name  and  fame 
as  professor  and  lecturer  and  organizer.  He  was  a 
man  who  could  bring  things  to  pass.  And  if,  at 
times,  he  was  ready  to  be  ruthless,  ready  to  take  ad- 
vantage of  technicalities,  it  is  not  impossible  that 
the  possession  of  such  practical  qualities  would  but 
the  more  endear  him  to  the  greatest  business  man 
of  the  world.  A  position  at  Yale  was  assured  him, 
backed  by  a  specially  raised  and  permanent  endow- 
ment, but  in  spite  of  Yale's  strong  effort  to  hold 
him  the  Chicago  University  won. 

And  the  strangest  thing  in  regard  to  him,  all-alive 
man  that  he  was,  the  very  personification  of  energy 
and  of  up-to-the-minute  life,  was  that  he  had  won 
his  way,  primarily,  through  being  a  student  and  pro- 
fessor of  Hebrew  and  Assyrian,  of  Syriac,  of  Arabic 
and  Aramaic!  This  worker  of  miracles  rose  from 
the  dead  languages. 

And  there  were  quaintly  odd  qualities  too.  It  is 

245 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

remembered  that  lie  was  a  cornet  player,  and  that 
as  a  young  man  he  played  as  a  member  of  a  band, 
and  that  after  becoming  a  university  president  in 
Chicago  he  did  not  forget  his  early  musical  love  but 
would  often  play  his  precious  cornet  for  recreation 
(his  own,  of  course).  As  another  recreation,  thus 
the  tale  has  sifted  into  university  lore,  he  would 
take  a  fast  train  to  New  York,  merely  to  turn  about 
and  take  another  fast  train  back  to  Chicago.  Being 
a  steam-engine,  he  needed  safety  valves. 

He  succeeded  in  setting  the  university  in  motion. 
He  indefatigably  dictated,  managed,  organized. 
Under  the  years  of  his  administration  the  univer- 
sity went  successfully  on.  And  he  personally  won 
intense  admiration  for  his  abilities. 

Then,  one  day,  two  of  the  faculty  with  whom  he 
was  on  terms  of  special  intimacy,  were  summoned 
to  his  home.  They  hurried  over,  and  greeted  with 
cheerfulness — even  with  hilarity,  as  one  of  them  has 
recorded — their  round-faced,  spectacled,  stockily- 
built  chief,  for  they  were  in  high  spirits  in  anticipa- 
tion of  some  special  news.  And  it  was  indeed 
special  news  that  they  were  to  be  given. 

Harper,  calm  and  quietly  master  of  himself,  said : 
"I  have  asked  you  to  come,  to  say  that  I  have  to- 
day received  my  death  sentence  from  my  physi- 
cians. ' ' 

Thus  was  the  grim  news  given.  He  lived  on  for 
over  a  year,  doing  in  that  time  what  was  even  for 
him  a  tremendous  amount  of  work,  for  he  knew  that, 
for  him,  night  was  near  at  hand.  It  was  cancer. 

246 


AN  OXFORD  OF  THE  WEST 

And  in  1906  he  died,  after  but  half  a  century  of  super- 
strenuous  life. 

Fortunately  there  was  a  man  ready  and  fitted  to 
take  his  place.  Harper  had  from  the  very  beginning 
chosen  Harry  Pratt  Judson  as  his  right-hand  man. 
Judson  was  of  fine  scholarship  and  of  managerial 
ability.  He  now  became  president.  He  could  not 
have  done  what  Harper  did,  in  beginning,  organiz- 
ing, setting  in  motion,  grinding  into  workable  shape. 
Harper  could  not  have  done  what  Judson  has  done, 
in  rounding  and  smoothing  and  adjusting.  The  uni- 
versity has  been  extraordinarily  fortunate  in  having 
two  such  men,  alike  and  yet  so  unlike,  as  its  suc- 
cessional  presidents  in  the  first  thirty  years  of  its 
life. 

The  first  building  of  the  university  was  begun  in 
1891,  and  students  began  to  come  in  1892;  unmind- 
ful of  the  obvious  jests  regarding  the  expected  "re- 
fining" influences  of  the  oil-founded  institution. 
And  the  number  of  students  has  steadily  increased, 
until  now  the  university  reports  show  an  annual 
total  of  about  ten  thousand. 

As  the  university  began,  there  came  the  oddest 
of  building  apparitions  beside  it.  For  adjoining  the 
first  university  buildings  there  was  constructed  the 
fenced-in  Midway  Plaisance.  The  unexpected 
proximity  of  this  branch  of  the  Great  Fair  caused 
amazed  hilarity.  Of  those  first  days,  those  begin- 
nings, one  of  the  students  gayly  wrote : 

247 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

Oh,  there  were  more  profs  than  students,  but  then  we  didn't 

care; 
They  spent  their  days  in  research  work,  their  evenings  at 

the  Fair. 

And  life  upon  the  campus  was  one  continual  swing ; 
We  watched  the  Ferris  Wheel  go  round,  and  didn't  do  a 

thing. 

The  land  hereabouts  was  low  and  swampy,  re- 
quiring to  be  filled  in,  and  for  the  filling  there  were 
used  great  quantities  of  the  debris  from  the  build- 
ings of  the  World's  Fair,  and  it  was  long  remem- 
bered that  for  years,  in  wandering  about,  one  might 
see  fragments  of  "staff,"  largely  of  classic  design, 
sticking  up  through  the  grass,  giving  a  queer  im- 
pression of  walking  over  classic  ground  as,  say,  of 
the  Eoman  Campagna. 

And  that  chance  effect  as  of  the  ancient  calls  at- 
tention anew  to  the  actual  aiming  at  the  ancient: 
to  the  attempt  of  the  new  university — new,  but  now 
numbering  among  its  teaching  staff  some  who  were 
born  since  its  founding! — to  make  itself  look  like 
Oxford,  doubtless  with  the  idea  that  following  the 
outward  and  visible  sign  would  come  inward  and 
collegiate  grace.  And  this  city  of  miracles  did  the 
work  of  five  centuries  in  a  quarter  of  a  century. 

The  university  buildings  are  within  the  city 
limits,  and  only  seven  miles  from  the  business  center. 
Yet  here  has  arisen  an  Oxford  with  a  splendidly 
beautiful  Gothic  architecture.  (And  the  love  and 
appreciation  of  this  very  new  city  for  ancient  Gothic 
is  itself  surprising.) 

248 


LIBRARY 

OF  THE 

UNIVERSITY  OF  ILLINOIS 


AN  OXFORD  OF  THE  WEST 

There  was  no  thought  of  going  off  to  some  pic- 
turesque locality  to  gain  picturesque  surroundings. 
The  university  was  to  be  in  and  of  Chicago.  Flat ! 
Of  course  it  was  flat!  And  on  an  area  of  flatness 
has  arisen  beauty. 

Approach  the  clustered  buildings  from  the  direc- 
tion of  Cottage  Grove  Avenue  and  you  are  amazed 
to  notice  the  steep  roofs,  the  mullioned  windows,  the 
stone  gables.  It  seems  incredible;  but  the  effect  is 
deepened  and  strengthened  as  the  buildings  are 
neared  and  reached,  and  still  more  deeply  strength- 
ened as  you  go  about  among  them,  through  the  Ox- 
ford-like quadrangles.  To  Charles  A.  Coolidge,  as 
architect,  most  of  these  buildings,  which  so  repro- 
duce an  ancient  scholastic  age  and  so  represent  an 
ancient  environment,  are  due;  and  they  are  far  in 
advance  of  Oxford  in  possessing  the  most  modern 
appliances  for  health  and  convenience  and  comfort. 

With  corbels  and  crockets  and  pinnacles,  with 
floors  of  oak  and  stairways  of  oak,  with  feudal-look- 
ing entrances  and  passages,  with  sun-dials  and 
gargoyles  and  stone  turrets  and  wrought-iron  gates, 
with  friezes  of  stone,  with  oriel  windows  and 
windows  casemented,  with  buttresses  and  pinnacles, 
with  ancient-seeming  stone  bridges  between  build- 
ings, there  is  wealth  of  fascinating  detail. 

It  is  partly  by  copying  that  the  general  appear- 
ance of  Oxford  is  secured,  and  partly  by  working 
under  Oxford  influence.  And,  as  one  of  the  pro- 
fessors put  it  whimsically,  "It's  like  the  Scotchman 
who  was  asked  if  it  always  rained  in  Scotland. 

249 


'No,'  was  his  reply;  'whiles  it  snaws.'  So,  whiles 
it  is  not  Oxford  but  Cambridge." 

Most  noticeable  of  the  buildings  is  the  Harper 
Memorial  Library;  a  beautifully  massive  structure, 
with  massive  stone  towers,  a  building  really  superb. 
It  is  two  hundred  and  sixty  feet  long,  having  been 
planned  for  ample  space  for  library  needs.  Al- 
though among  the  newest  of  the  buildings  it  has 
already  begun  to  acquire  a  gentle  patina  as  of  time ; 
it  would  be  admired  as  a  beautiful  and  fitting  build- 
ing if  it  were  actually  at  quadrangled  Oxford,  and 
therefore  it  should  be  recognized  as  a  beautiful 
building  here  in  quadrangled  University  of  Chicago. 
And  if  it  be  said  it  has  not  the  lists  of  men  that 
come  with  the  centuries — why,  time  will  remedy  that. 
For  men  will  come  and  men  will  go,  and,  so  the  city 
hopes,  the  university  will  go  on  forever. 

There  is  spaciousness  for  books  and  reading,  and 
there  are  mighty  stacks  of  books  resting  their 
weight,  not  on  the  floor,  but  down  upon  the  very 
foundations,  and  there  is  a  great  reading-room  which 
is  itself  a  glory.  It  is  a  great  hall  of  stone,  with 
fan  tracery  in  the  high  stone  ceiling  and  with  a  line 
of  seven  great  Gothic  windows,  stone  mullioned  and 
heavily  leaded,  and  all  of  clear  glass,  on  either  side. 
There  is  a  marvelous  effect  of  gray;  everything 
seems  to  be  of  an  exquisite  silver  gray ;  gray  stone, 
gray  lead  and  glass,  gray  linen  at  the  windows  of 
the  same  gray  hue  as  the  stone,  to  draw  down  on  the 
sunny  side,  and  even  the  floor  of  gray.  You  are  told 

250 


that  it  is  planned  to  make  an  end  of  this  gray  beauty, 
marvel  of  restraint  that  it  is,  with  colored  mural 
decorations,  "when  there  is  money  enough";  this 
last  phrase  being  entirely  without  intent  of  humor, 
such  being  the  mental  standpoint  of  any  institution 
which  has  always  depended  upon  donations,  al- 
though in  this  case  the  founder  has  announced,  in 
all  good  feeling,  that  he  has  himself  given  his  last 
payment  to  it.  But  a  donation-supported  institu- 
tion never  thinks  that  it  has  enough.  One  can  only 
hope,  in  regard  to  the  unhappy  project  of  changing 
the  effect  of  exquisite  gray,  that  the  time  will  never 
come  when  there  shall  be  " money  enough." 

At  each  end  of  the  library  hall  is  a  stone  gallery, 
with  rail  and  reredos  expressing  the  gorgeousness 
of  the  Gothic,  and  through  each  reredos  is  an  en- 
trance-way. Books  are  on  oaken  shelves  along  the 
walls,  beneath  the  windows,  and  there  are  massive 
reading  tables  and  solidly  comfortable  chairs.  And 
at  either  end,  as  I  write,  is  a  stand  of  colors;  not 
the  colors  of  foreign  lands,  but  glorious  American 
colors,  seven  flags  in  each  stand,  arranged  more 
superbly  than  any  that  I  have  ever  elsewhere  seen. 

Leaving  the  library,  there  is  in  every  direction 
something  to  be  seen  that  is  distinguished  or  strik- 
ing; and  the  eye  rests  with  pleasure  upon  Mitchell 
Tower,  modeled  as  it  is  after  charming  Magdalen. 
There  is  a  chime  of  ten  bells  in  this  tower  and  their 
ringing  has  been  made  an  impressive  feature  of  the 
university  life,  for  solemn  and  sweet  the  towered 

251 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

chimes  are  for  various  occasions  sounded,  and  every 
night,  at  five  minutes  after  ten,  they  ring  the  "Alma 
Mater." 

Within  Hutchinson  Hall,  adjoining,  is  a  noble 
dining  hall,  remindful  of  the  dining-hall  of  Oxford 's 
Christ  Church.  The  great  room  is  dark  and  somber, 
with  timber  roof,  and  with  eight  tall  Gothic  windows 
on  each  side,  set  high  like  a  clerestory.  The  walls 
are  of  gray  stone,  paneled  in  brown  oak.  There 
is  a  carved  frieze  of  oak,  with  the  arms  of  various 
colleges,  in  colors,  beneath  the  windows.  There  are 
appetizing  odors  from  the  adjoining  kitchens.  And 
the  only  unbeautiful  feature,  but  an  amusing  one,  is 
the  huge  crockery  water-pitchers,  such  as  one  sees 
in  the  dining-room  at  West  Point.  There  are  two 
real  fireplaces,  in  stone.  The  hall  is  finely  given  a 
hundred  and  fifteen  feet  in  length,  forty  feet  in 
width,  and  fifty  feet  in  height ;  and,  as  with  the  Ox- 
ford original,  and  the  dining  hall  at  Harvard  which 
was  inspired  by  that  original,  there  are  lines  of  por- 
traits along  the  walls,  of  men  importantly  connected 
with  the  university. 

There  is  a  Rockefeller  by  Eastman  Johnson,  show- 
ing him  a  quiet  business  man  seated  in  a  Chippen- 
dale chair,  with  accessories  simple  and  excellent; 
and  the  books  upon  which  his  hand  rests  are  not 
elaborately  bound.  There  is  a  portrait  by  Lawton 
Parker,  of  Martin  A.  Eyerson,  a  leading  citizen  of 
Chicago  who  has  been  a  finely  liberal  and  constant 
friend  of  the  university.  There  is  a  Gari  Melchers 
portrait  of  President  Harper,  presenting  him  stand- 

252 


AN  OXFOKD  OF  THE  WEST 

ing  against  a  gray-green  wall  in  gown  of  purple  and 
red  and  blue,  and  with  gold-tasselled  mortar- 
board. There  is  a  President  Judson,  by  Lawton 
Parker,  gray-mustached,  and  in  purplish  gown  and 
hood.  There  is  a  Frank  W.  Gunsaulus,  scarlet- 
hooded  and  with  a  red  book  in  his  left  hand:  and 
there  comes  to  mind  an  expression  used  by  him  in 
a  commencement  address  at  Oberlin  in  1920:  "  Edu- 
cation," said  Gunsaulus  (himself  not  only  a  pro- 
fessor of  the  Chicago  university  but  also  President 
of  Armour  Institute),  " education  is  not  what  you 
put  into  a  man ;  it  is  what  you  find  in  him  and  pull 
out";  and  therein  seemed  to  speak  the  voice  of 
Chicago.  There  is  a  portrait  of  Charles  L.  Hutchin- 
son,  by  Betts,  standing  against  a  background  of 
gray-green.  And  there  are  numerous  others. 

One  imagines  visitors  of  the  future,  even  of  the 
future  of  centuries  hence,  walking  through  this  hall 
and,  guide-book  in  hand,  picking  out  by  name,  and 
noting  what  manner  of  men  they  were,  leaders,  in 
finance  and  education,  who  stood  behind  the  univer- 
sity in  its  formative  years. 

Among  the  other  portraits  in  Hutchinson  Hall, 
are  several  by  Ralph  Clarkson,  one  of  them  being 
of  Silas  B.  Cobb,  who  was  among  the  first  of  the 
donors  of  great  sums  to  the  university.  Cobb  died 
in  1900.  He  had  come  to  Chicago  in  1833.  And 
what  made  him  especially  interesting  was — and  it 
points  out,  as  dates  alone  could  not  point  out,  the 
strikingly  short  period  during  which  the  city  has 
grown — that  he  liked  to  say  that  every  building 

253  ' 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

standing  in  Chicago  had  been  erected  during  his 
residence  there! 

Greenery  and  shrubs  and  flowers  and  climbing 
vines  have  become  an  important  feature  of  the  uni- 
versity grounds.  Much  of  the  growth  is  lush  and 
lavish.  And  when  the  oncewhile  Midway  space, 
now  a  magnificent  boulevard,  six  hundred  feet  wide 
and  a  mile  long,  shall  be  converted  into  a  long  sheet 
of  water,  there  will  thus  be  secured  a  glorious  ef- 
fect. And  even  as  it  is,  it  is  attractive;  it  may  be 
even  beautiful;  as  one  evening,  when  there  was  a 
beautiful  sunset  such  as  Turner  would  have  painted, 
a  sunset  all  dull  red  and  glowing  with  splendid  color 
tones. 

There  are  no  visible  university  limits,  no  walling 
up  or  fencing  in.  The  university  merges  with  the 
city;  and  this,  I  take  it,  is  indicative  of  a  purpose 
to  merge  with  modern  life. 

The  general  atmosphere  is  that  of  earnestness, 
softened  by  geniality  and  humor.  This  is  not  par- 
ticularly illustrated  by  the  colloquial  pronunciation 
of  Ida  Noyes  Hall ;  a  beautiful  building,  for  women 
students,  and  rather  more  in  Tudor  style  than 
Gothic;  but  merely  as  a  genial  example  of  college 
humor  it  may  be  mentioned  that  instantly,  on  its 
completion,  this  beautiful  Ida  Noyes  Hall  was  just 
naturally  given,  in  college  talk,  the  name  of 
Adenoids  Hall. 

The  members  of  the  university  faculty  now 
number  almost  five  hundred.  This  makes,  to  quite 
an  extent,  for  specialization;  and  it  is  a  faculty 

254 


AN  OXFORD  OF  THE  WEST 

story,  as  a  special  example  of  this  tendency,  that  a 
Biblical  professor  among  them,  when  asked  a  ques- 
tion about  St.  Paul,  replied,  with  dignified  dis- 
pleasure, "St.  Paul  is  in  the  New  Testament";  add- 
ing, in  grave  reproof,  and  with  marked  accent  on 
the  "my,"  "My  field  is  the  Old  Testament."  And 
a  correlated  story  is  of  the  college  scrub  woman 
who  would  not  answer  a  question  as  to  the  loca- 
tion of  a  professor's  room,  and  doggedly  refused 
even  to  point  out  the  office  of  the  president;  her 
determined  words  of  finality  marking  the  last  word 
in  college  specialization;  for  "I  only  know  about 
scrubbing,"  she  said. 


255 


CHAPTER  XVIII 


THE  DUKES   OF   CHICAGO 


T  was  long  ago  remarked 
that  he  that  rnleth  his 
spirit  is  greater  than  he 
that  taketh  a  city;  but  cer- 
tain men,  in  Chicago,  have 
not  only  ruled  their  own 
spirits  but  a  great  many 
very  tumultuous  spirits  be- 
sides, and  have  at  the  same 
time  taken  charge  of  the 
city  of  Chicago  and 
ruled  that  too;  thoroughly 
( 'bossed"  it,  to  use  a  familiar  American  word. 

There  have  been  a  number  of  such  jaen,  and  they 
have  held  the  mayoralty  office  for  a  total  of  many 
terms,  and  I  like  to  think  of  them  as  the  Dukes  of 
Chicago.  Not  in  the  sense  in  which  the  term  is 
understood  in  England,  as  meaning  a  set  of 
enormously  wealthy  individuals,  with  great  houses, 
still  astonishingly  intent  upon  finding  means, of  get- 
ting more  money.  Nor  do  I  use  the  expression  in 
the  sense  in  which  it  would  be  understood  in  Phila- 
delphia; it  was  but  a  few  years  ago  that  a  young 
woman  of  that  city,  traveling  in  England,  declared 

256 


THE  DUKES  OF  CHICAGO 

to  some  English  acquaintance  that,  if  her  city  were 
part  of  England,  her  father  would  be  Duke  of  Phila- 
delphia; and,  indeed,  just  to  go  back  a  few  genera- 
tions, one  Wharton,  in  the  time  of  the  Eevolution, 
whose  estate  was  used  for  the  Mischianza,  was  com- 
monly referred  to  as  "Duke  Wharton,"  because 
he  was  very  wealthy  and  a  leader  of  what  is  known 
as  society.  But  when  I  use  the  phrase,  "Dukes  of 
Chicago"  I  use  the  word  "duke"  in  its  strong 
original  sense  of  "dux"  the  leader,  the  man  who 
controls,  the  man  who  commands  and  is  obeyed. 
And  in  that  sense  this  city  has  been  ruled  for.  many 
mayoralty  terms. 

It  is  among  the  most  extraordinary  of  civic 
phenomena;  or  rather,  among  the  most  singular — 
to  observe  a  distinction  made  somewhere  by  one 
of  the  characters  of  Dickens — that  Chicago  loves  to 
be  arbitrarily  ruled.  Perhaps  one  may  fairly  de- 
clare it  to  be  both  extraordinary  and  singular. 
Strong  though  the  city  is,  assertive,  full  of  energy, 
forceful,  vehement,  stubborn,  eager,  mighty,  potent, 
in  general  impatient  of  control,  she  yet  accepts  the 
control  of  her  ruler.  It  shows  how  easy  it  is  to  rule 
people,  by  merely  insisting  upon  it — and  insisting 
with  politic  understanding. 

To  judge  from  public  clamor,  when  Chicago  is 
under,  the  control  of  some  such  ruler,  the  citizens 
wish  nothing  so  much  as  to  get  rid  of  his  rule. 
There  will  not  only  be  free  criticism,  and  the  very 
harshest  of  denunciation,  but  likely  enough  the  en- 
tire press  of  the  city  will  be  arrayed  against  him. 

257 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

But,  when  the  votes  are  counted,  he  will  be  found 
again  to  have  a  majority  of  them. 

The  man  who  most  strikingly  carried  out  the  idea 
of  strong-handed  rule,  the  elder  Carter  Harrison, 
followed  a  remarkable  example  of  how  to  do  it  suc- 
cessfully. Doubtless  he  had  instinctive  ability  for 
the  role  of  ruler,  but  the  inspiration,  and  the  sugges- 
tion of  the  very  heart  of  his  method  came  from 
France.  As  a  young  man  he  was  in  Paris,  at  the 
time  of  the  successful  coup  d'etat  of  Napoleon  the 
Third.  He  was  tremendously  interested  in  the 
scenes  of  violence  and  was  in  constant  expectation 
that  the  people  would  resist.  He  could  not  believe 
that  a  brave  and  high-tempered  and  advanced  people 
would  permit  the  overthrow  of  their  republic  by  a 
chief  magistrate  who  wanted  to  increase  his  power. 
But  a  distinguished  French  woman  with  whom  he 
eagerly  spoke  about  it,  only  shrugged  her  shoulders 
and  said:  "But  you  do  not  understand!  The 
people  will  only  thank  Napoleon  for  giving  them  so 
magnificent  a  show." 

That  was  the  most  important  practical  lesson  of 
his  life.  It  gave  him  the  secret  of  ruling  the  unruly. 
And  he  clearly  saw  that  in  connection  with  keeping 
the  people  amused,  and  giving  them  a  show,  must 
be  the  constant  and  assured  exercise  of  power. 
Whether  or  not  this  would  always  and  everywhere 
be  a  winning  system,  he  saw  that  it  won  in  Paris 
and  he  later  found  that  it  won  in  Chicago.  He 
never  forgot  Napoleon  the  Third.  Like  Napoleon, 
Harrison  amused  his  public.  He  gave  them  shows. 

258 


THE  DUKES  OF  CHICAGO 

Whether  standing  as  representative  of  his  city  in 
welcoming  distinguished  visitors,  whether  riding 
down  the  street  on  horseback,  doffing  his  broad  felt 
hat  to  right  and  left,  whether  leading  a  parade  or 
being  a  parade  all  by  himself,  whether  saying  some- 
thing striking  and  quotable,  he  kept  the  city  in- 
terested— and  interested  in  himself!  He  was 
literally  the  "man  on  horseback." 

It  is  worth  while  noting  that  this  city,  disregard- 
ful  as  it  is  of  the  formal  claims  of  "family,"  this 
city,  whose  people  do  not  spend  their  time  in  climb- 
ing up  family  trees,  who  stand  on  their  own  legs 
and  not  on  those  of  their  grandfathers,  does  after 
all  pay  a  good  deal  of  attention  to  ancestry  although 
apparently  unaware  of  doing  so;  it  likes  to  know 
that  its  distinguished  folk  could,  if  they  so  wished, 
refer  to  ancestry  of  distinguished  folk;  that  "they 
could  an'  if  they  would."  Chicago  cares  little  to 
talk  of  such  things,  and  always  a  man  must  justify 
his  ancestry  by  his  own  abilities,  by  his  own  achieve- 
ments ;  but,  with  ability  and  achievements  obviously 
existent,  a  touch  of  ancestry  may  add  a  desirable 
tang. 

Born  in  Kentucky,  Carter  Harrison  came  of  a  long 
line  of  distinguished  Virginians.  There  was,  too, 
in  his  blood,  and  this  is  especially  odd  in  regard  to 
Chicago,  with  its  early  Norman  connection,  a  flavor 
of  Norman  descent;  and  this  helps  to  explain  his 
being  a  natural  ruler.  The  name  of  a  Harrison, 
in  ancestral  connection,  is  listed  among  the  dead 
on  the  Hastings-like  "Battle  Boll"  of  Tippecanoe, 

259 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

and  the  commander  himself  at  Tippecanoe,  General 
Harrison,  was  also  a  connection  ancestrally.  Carter 
Harrison  was  descended,  directly  and  collaterally, 
from  long  lines  of  fighters  and  leaders. 

When  he  went  to  Washington  as  Congressman,  he 
found  that  he  did  not  much  care  for  being  there. 
Like  Big  Tim  Sullivan,  of  New  York,  who  found  that 
Washington  was  much  too  far  from  the  Bowery,  so 
Harrison  found  that  Washington  was  much  too  far 
from  the  block  bounded  by  West  Randolph,  North 
Clark,  West  Washington  and  North  La  Salle  Streets. 
But  he  managed  to  get  a  good  deal  of  joy  out  of  his 
Washington  life  and  to  keep  the  people  at  home 
interested  in  what  he  did  and  said. 

Chicagoans,  even  yet,  chuckle  over  his  speech  in 
regard  to  the  proposed  abolishing  of  the  Marine 
Band,  for  after  picturing  the  Republican  Presidents, 
and  their  friends,  in  the  city  of  Washington,  in  white 
vests  and  white  cravats,  listening  to  the  "  dulcet 
tones  poured  forth  from  the  silvered  throats  of  sil- 
vered instruments  by  twenty-four  gentlemen  in  scar- 
let coats,"  he  deemed  it  unfair,  as  he  declared,  to  de- 
prive the  next  President,  who,  he  was  sure,  was  to 
be  a  Democrat,  of  the  pleasure  of  enjoying  in  com- 
pany with  his  white-tied  and  white-vested  Democratic 
friends,  the  silver  music  from  the  silvered  instru- 
ments of  the  twenty-four  scarlet-coated  players. 
1 '  Shall  the  coming  Democratic  President  be  deprived 
of  this  music!  No,  sir!  never!" 

When  he  was  mayor,  Harrison  amused  the  people, 
as  old-timers  tell,  by  gravely  presenting  the  "free- 

260 


THE  DUKES  OF  CHICAGO 

dom  of  the  city"  to  Colonel  Mapleson — " Colonel 
James  Henry  Mapleson,  of  Her  Majesty's  Theater" 
— and,  without  serious  meaning  as  it  was,  still, 
Colonel  James  Henry  Mapleson,  of  Her  Majesty's 
Theater,  saw  good  advertising  in  it,  and  exploited 
the  fact  that  he  was  the  first  of  Englishmen  to  re- 
ceive such  an  honor  from  Chicago;  and,  so  he  de- 
clared, returning  courtesy  for  courtesy,  the  city  of 
Chicago  was  certain,  within  a  few  years,  to  become 
the  first  city  of  the  United  States  and  probably  of 
the  world.  Thus  Mapleson  and  his  friends  were  all 
pleased,  and  every  Chicagoan  was  pleased,  and 
everybody  was  at  the  same  time  amused,  and  Harri- 
son added  as  usual  to  the  number  of  his  friends  and 
admirers. 

He  married,  in  Kentucky,  and  the  wedding  trip 
was  at  the  same  time  a  search  for  the  town  which 
was  to  be  the  home  of  his  wife  and  himself.  At 
that  time  they  knew  nothing  of  Chicago.  St.  Louis 
drew  and  almost  held  them,  but,  Southerners 
though  they  were,  they  found  the  atmosphere  of  slav- 
ery unpleasant,  and  turned  their  thoughts  to  the  then 
promising  Galena.  But  at  Galena  there  were  too 
many  mosquitoes!  On  such  odd  things  do  impor- 
tant decisions  at  times  depend ! 

They  went  to  Chicago,  still  not  seriously  thinking 
of  it  as  their  home-town,  but  taking  it  on  their  jour- 
ney. They  found  the  city  full  of  unpleasantnesses, 
and  swampy.  It  needed  the  eye  of  faith.  But  Har- 
rison possessed  the  eye  of  faith.  He  saw  beyond  the 
swamps  to  the  future  glories  of  the  city.  He  recog- 

261 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

nized  the  unusual  character  of  the  people  even  at  that 
early  time.  Newly  though  he  had  come  from  view- 
ing the  cities  of  Europe,  and  liable  though  he  thus 
was  to  misjudge  a  raw  city  of  our  West,  he  was  clear- 
sighted and  clear-headed.  Comparing  the  finished 
cities  of  Europe  with  the  then  rough-looking  Chicago, 
with  its  probabilities  of  greatness,  he  deemed  those 
cities  finished  indeed  while  Chicago  was  but  begin- 
ning. He  bought  land  at  the  junction  of  Clark  and 
Harrison  Streets,  perhaps  somewhat  influenced  in 
his  choice  by  finding  a  street  with  his  own  name, 
although  it  of  course  represented  the  great  William 
Henry.  He  put  up  a  hotel,  and  lived  there  for  a 
time.  Throughout,  one  notices  the  gravitation  of 
Chicagoans  of  prominence  toward  the  ownership  of 
hotels.  And  hotel-owning  was  especially  fitting  for 
a  Duke  of  Chicago,  for  I  remember  that  in  London 
(at  least  it  was  so  previous  to  the  World  War), 
English  dukes  owned  London  hotels  in  business 
rivalry,  and  an  American  might,  for  example,  patron- 
ize one  of  the  hotels  of  the  Duke  of  Bedford  or  be 
welcomed  at  a  hotel  of  the  Duke  of  Westminster. 

When  Harrison  was  at  length  elected  mayor,  he 
made  himself  so  liked  that  he  was  elected  for  term 
after  term  till  he  had  been  chosen  for  four  terms  in 
succession.  He  had  promptly  become  <a  profoundly 
worshiped  idol.  He  was  known  to  be  absolutely 
fearless.  He  stood  for  good  government,  in  the 
sense  of  maintaining  order  in  the  city  and  seeing 
that  the  various  departments  of  the  municipal  gov- 
ernment did  their  duty.  But  he  used  the  immense 

262 


LIBRARY 

OF  THE 

UNIVERSITY  OF  ILLINOIS 


THE  DUKES  OF  CHICAGO 

patronage  power  of  mayoralty  as  a  means  of  rewards 
and  punishments.  He  believed  in  personal  liberty. 
Press  and  pulpit  attacked  him,  but  the  people  rallied 
to  him.  In  essence  he  was  following  what  he  had 
long  ago  learned  from  Napoleon  the  Third — he  was 
giving  the  people  a  show;  and  in  two  senses!  For 
they  knew  that  he  was  "giving  them  a  fair  show," 
and  he  knew  that  he  was  at  the  same  time  keeping 
them  interested. 

After  the  four  terms  he  decided  to  drop  out  for  a 
time,  and  sailed  for  the  Orient,  not  only  to  see  more 
of  the  world,  but  to  study  arbitrary  government  in 
the  eastern  lands  where  nothing  else  had  ever  been 
known. 

To  understand  Harrison  is  to  understand  the  spirit 
of  Chicago;  and  the  impress  of  Harrison  is  still 
strong  upon  the  city.  Eeturning,  he  ran  again  for 
the  mayoralty.  Heatedly  charged  with  being  a  boss, 
he  quietly  responded  that  the  charge  was  true.  Of 
course  he  was  a  boss!  And  actually,  he  was  quite 
ready  to  admit  that  his  opponent  was  not  in  the  least 
a  boss.  "But,"  he  grimly  declared,  "my  opponent 
is  bossed  by  the  boss  of  his  party.  But  I  am  my  own 
boss  and  the  boss  of  my  party  too!" 

He  knew  his  city,  street  by  street,  house  by  house, 
man  by  man.  And  he  saw  to  it  that  the  entire  city 
knew  Lim  in  return.  Nose  longish  and  straight,  ears 
close-set,  eyes  within  which,  far  back,  was  the  glint 
which  marks  the  ruler — no  wonder  it  was  said  of  him 
that  when  he  looked  sternly  at  a  man  it  was  like 
aiming  a  pistol  at  him.  But  he  was  to  find  that  even 

263 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

this  look  might  have  practical  shortcomings  as  com- 
pared with  a  literal  pistol. 

In  1893  Chicago  was  to  have  a  show  that  would 
astonish  the  world.  The  people  demanded  that  their 
favorite  again  take  leadership.  They  wanted  him 
to  stand  for  them  when  the  world  came  flocking  to 
the  Fair.  He  was  elected  amid  scenes  of  wild  excite- 
ment. And  at  once  he  began  to  fasten  his  control 
upon  the  city,  even  more  firmly  than  before. 

As  the  city's  executive  he  well  played  his  part. 
He  met  visitors  and  visiting  associations.  He  ad- 
dressed myriad  bodies  and  delegations,  from  all 
parts  of  our  own  country  and  of  the  world. 

Though  he  was  sixty-eight  years  of  age  he  still 
felt  in  the  full  vigor  of  his  strength.  But  his  star 
was  about  to  set. 

The  great  Fair  drew  toward  its  end.  The  great 
mayor  still  went  about,  making  a  friend  whenever  he 
doffed  his  broad-brimmed  hat.  On  October  the 
twenty-eighth,  1893,  after  addressing  mayors  who 
had  gathered  from  all  over  the  country  (fitting  finale, 
for  him,  the  most  prominent  of  all  mayors !)  he  went 
to  his  home,  and  was  there  sought  out  by  a  disap- 
pointed office-seeker,  and  was  shot  and  killed  in  his 
own  house. 

But,  as  if  in  fact  an  hereditary  ruler — and  this  is 
the  most  wonderful  evidence  of  his  power — he  had 
so  won  control  that  he  was  able  to  leave  the  ruler- 
ship  to  his  son.  And  notable  though  his  record  was, 
of  five  elections,  still  more  notable  was  it  that  his 
son,  also  bearing  the  name  of  Carter  Harrison,  was 

264 


THE  DUKES  OF  CHICAGO 

likewise  elected  mayor  for  five  terms;  father  and 
son  thus  uniting  in  ten  terms  of  a  great  city's 
mayoralty ! 

No  wonder  that  many  a  puzzled  Chicagoan  has 
firmly  believed  that  it  was  the  first  Carter  Harrison 
he  was  voting  for,  when  he  was  really  voting  for  the 
son. 

"  'I  voted  f 'r  Carter  Haitch,'  said  Dugan.  'IVe 
been  with  him  in  six  ilictions  and  he 's  a  good  man, ' 
he  says. 

"  'Why,  man  alive/ 1  says,  'Carter  Haitch  was  as- 
sassinated three  years  ago/  I  says. 

"  'Was  he?'  says  Dugan.  'Ah,  well,  he's  lived 
that  down  be  this  time.'  " 

The  first  Harrison  did  not  learn  his  politics  alto- 
gether from  his  observations  in  France.  He  had 
also  observed  that  the  general  run  of  Chicago  may- 
ors had  been  firm  men,  rulers,  not  themselves  to  be 
ruled.  He  had  seen,  in  Chicago  as  well  as  in  Paris, 
that  a  democratic  community  will  yield  surprisingly 
to  a  man  determined  to  rule. 

Of  the  other  strong  and  arbitrary  mayors  who 
have  shown  Chicago  how  it  may  be  governed  with 
a  strong  hand,  Long  John  Wentworth  was  the  most 
striking.  He  it  was  who  brought  back  from  the 
House  of  Eepresentatives,  in  Washington,  the  story 
of  how  old  John  Quincy  Adams  leaned  across  the 
aisle  to  ask  him  how  they  pronounced  the  name  of 
that  "queer  place  out  there."  He  it  was  who  used 
the  first  fire  engine  of  the  city  to  sweep  into  the  lake 
the  houses  of  an  unsavory  neighborhood. 

265 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

Long  John  made  no  secret  of  the  fact  that  he  held 
a  good  opinion  of  himself.  When  an  ambitious  local 
writer  sent  him  a  history  of  Chicago,  asking  for  his 
opinion  of  it,  Wentworth  calmly  marked  out  every 
part  that  did  not  refer  to  himself,  and  sent  it  back 
with  the  comment  that  now  it  was  a  correct  history 
of  the  city. 

It  was  Wentworth  who  ruled  in  1860,  when  the 
Prince  of  Wales — long  afterwards  to  be  Edward  the 
Seventh — visited  the  place.  And  this  big  mayor 
bossed  the  prince  just  as  naturally  as  he  bossed 
Chicagoans.  It  is  curious,  by  the  way,  that  the 
Prince  of  Wales  went  there,  not  to  see  the  city  but 
only  with  the  intent  to  shoot  prairie  chickens ;  itself 
a  comment  on  the  recent  development  of  the  place ; 
and  he  frankly  found  the  city  surprisingly  full  of 
interest. 

Long  John  introduced  him  from  a  hotel  balcony, 
thus  doing  the  royal  visitor  full  American  honor. 
His  speech  of  introduction  was  brief. 

"Boys,  this  is  the  Prince  of  Wales.  He's  come 
here  to  see  the  city"  (he  said  nothing  of  prairie 
chickens!),  "and  I'm  going  to  show  him  around. 
Prince,"  with  a  wave  of  his  long  arm,  "these  are 
the  boys."  Can't  you  still  hear  them  cheer! 

Long  John  was  so  free  and  easy  that  the  Prince 
of  Wales  did  not  at  first  quite  understand  him,  and 
the  result  was  that  he  also  became  free  and  easy. 
But  when  he  spit  into  a  load  of  grain  on  board  a 
ship  getting  ready  to  sail  from  Rush  Street  Bridge, 
Wentworth,  who  stood  in  no  awe  of  royal  blood 

266 


THE  DUKES  OF  CHICAGO 

and  especially  when  royal  blood  did  not  mind  its 
manners,  instantly  yelled  a  decisive  warning: 
' '  Stop  that,  young  man !  Don 't  you  know  any  better 
than  to  spit  into  a  load  of  grain?" 

Wentworth,  like  every  successful  Chicagoan,  had 
a  full  share  of  confidence  in  his  city.  One  day  some 
men  were  speaking  of  what  had  been  done  for  the 
place  by  this,  that  or  the  other  leading  citizen, 
whereupon  Long  John  put  a  blunt  end  to  the  discus- 
sion by  saying :  ' '  I  never  heard  of  any  man  who  has 
done  more  for  Chicago  than  Chicago  has  done  for 
him." 

When  he  knew  that  he  was  dying,  he  directed  that 
no  name  be  put  upon  his  monument.  "You  don't 
need  to,  for  everybody  will  know  that  it  is  John 
Wentworth,"  he  said,  passing  to  his  end  with  that 
serene  and  typical  self-confidence.  Some  time  after 
his  death,  however,  his  name  was  put  upon  the 
stone. 

Mayor  Thompson  has  been  another  strong-handed 
ruler,  and,  as  with  Carter  Harrison,  his  ancestral 
line  stretches  nobly  back  to  the  earliest  Colonial 
days ;  not  to  Virginia,  however,  but  through  a  line  of 
New  England  leaders  and  administrators,  from  the 
ancient  Plymouth  times.  A  strong  man,  he  has 
faced  denunciation  and  opposition — until  election 
day  has  shown  him  to  be  a  favorite  after  all ! 

The  very  first  of  the  mayors  of  the  city,  William 
B.  Ogden,  was  the  first  one  to  illustrate  what  it  meant 
to  be  a  strong  ruler.  He  was  one  of  the  men  who 
really  governed.  He  was  at  the  same  time  a  man  of 

267 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

culture,  a  man  of  fine  and  liberal  tastes.  It  was  he 
who  first  built  his  home  from  the  plans  of  an  archi- 
tect instead  of  letting  the  builder  be  the  architect. 
It  was  he  who  secured  for  Chicago  the  artist,  Healy. 
He  traveled  in  Europe,  and  there  he  made  an  ad- 
mirable impression  among  people  of  standing  and 
discernment.  And  the  historian  Guizot,  so  it  has 
been  said,  declared  in  regard  to  him : 

' 'That  man  is  the  representative  American.    He 
built  Chicago. " 


268 


CHAPTER  XIX 


A   MABQUETTB   CBOSS 

MONO  the  charming 
ancient  features  of 
some  old  English 
towns  is  the  mar- 
ket cross,  across 
of  stone,  set  up  in  the 
center  of  business  activ- 
ity centuries  ago,  and 
now  offering  the  appeal 
of  picturesqueness  and 
time.  American  towns  will  never  have  them,  no 
matter  how  many  centuries  may  elapse,  for  market 
crosses  came  from  conditions  of  society  and  business 
of  a  vanished  time.  And  this  makes  it  the  more  in- 
teresting that  Chicago,  although  it  has  not  indeed  a 
market  cross,  has  a  Marquette  Cross ;  and  although 
the  cross  is  not  itself  ancient  it  marks  a  place  that 
was  anciently  made  a  place  of  note. 

Father  Marquette,  missionary  and  explorer,  im- 
mensely notable  in  a  period  of  notabilities,  spent  the 
winter  of  1674-5  on  the  site  of  the  future  Chicago, 
and  the  cross  has  been  erected  on  the  spot  where  his 
hut  was  built,  as  nearly  as  it  can  be  ascertained  from 

269 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

his  description  of  the  locality,  taken  in  connection 
with  the  probabilities  of  the  case.  How  it  takes  us 
back  into  the  glimmering  beginnings  of  Chicago  his- 
tory! 

It  would  not  be  deemed,  by  most  people,  that  the 
trip  into  the  Illinois  country,  a  journey  of  hardships, 
from  which  Marquette  was  returning,  could  by  any 
possibility  be  deemed  successful,  for  he  writes  that 
he  is  not  quite  sure  that  he  had  saved  even  a  single 
soul.  Had  there  been  only  one,  he  says  humbly,  he 
would  have  deemed  his  fatigues  well  repaid.  And 
then  his  heart  lightens  as  he  sets  down  that  he  thinks 
there  was  one  soul  saved,  after  all,  for  just  before 
reaching  the  Chicago  River  a  dying  child  had  been 
carried  to  him  and  he  had  baptized  it. 

The  stop  at  Chicago  was  made  perforce.  Mar- 
quette was  very  ill.  The  news  spread  through  the 
Indian  country,  and  the  Indians  were  profoundly 
affected,  for  they  loved  him  and  trusted  him,  even 
though  so  backward  about  being  formally  converted. 
Fortunately,  there  were  with  Marquette  two  faithful 
followers,  Frenchmen,  and  in  a  few  days  another 
Frenchman  appeared.  For  the  news  of  the  mission- 
ary's sickness  reached  a  French  surgeon,  who  was 
some  eighteen  leagues  away.  Who  the  surgeon  was, 
the  record  does  not  tell,  nor  how  it  happened  that  he 
was  in  that  distant  land.  He  figures  shadowily  in 
the  narrative  as  a  man  of  mystery.  He  is  just  "the 
surgeon."  And,  hearing  of  the  illness,  the  surgeon 
instantly  sets  out  for  the  Chicago,  with  a  supply  of 
blueberries  and  corn.  He  stayed  with  Marquette  for 

270 


some  days,  and  then  returned  whence  he  had  come — 
coming  out  of  mystery,  to  vanish  into  mystery  again. 
And  he  sent  to  Marquette  '  *  a  sack  of  corn  and  other 
delicacies." 

It  was  a  terrible  winter.  The  Indians  themselves 
were  suffering  from  cold  and  hunger,  as  deep  snows 
and  intense  cold  kept  them  from  hunting.  When 
Marquette 's  companions  managed  to  kill  some  deer 
the  animals  were  so  lean  as  to  be  uneatable  and  were 
abandoned. 

Through  miles  of  snowdrifts  came  a  party  of 
young  Indians,  bearing  more  corn,  and  dried  meat, 
and  pumpkins,  and  beaver-skins, ' '  on  behalf  of  their 
elders";  and  we  read  that  Marquette  gave  them  from 
his  diminished  stores,  a  hatchet,  two  knives,  three 
clasp-knives,  ten  sets  of  gold  beads — how  delight- 
fully particular  Marquette  could  be ! — and,  what  the 
Indians  dearly  loved,  two  mirrors ;  '  *  in  order  to  re- 
ward them  for  their  trouble  and  for  what  they  had 
brought  me." 

All  the  Indians  loved  him.  They  wanted  him  to 
live ;  but  if  he  must  die,  they  solemnly  told  him  that 
they  wanted  him  to  remain  in  their  country  till  the 
end. 

Late  in  March  the  ice  in  the  Chicago  Eiver  began 
to  break  up,  and  the  water  suddenly  rose,  and  he  and 
his  two  companions  tried  desperately  to  rescue  their 
belongings  by  getting  them  up  into  trees.  From  the 
brief  description  of  their  efforts,  in  the  darkness,  to 
save  their  lives  and  goods,  one  sees  a  case  of  des- 
perate misery,  even  had  Marquette  not  been  ill. 

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THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

On  March  31  they  managed  to  get  away  and 
plunged  again  into  the  Indian  country,  and  on  April 
6  is  the  pleasant  note,  "We  have  just  met  the  sur- 
geon, going  up  with  a  canoeload  of  furs. ' '  One  pic- 
tures the  friendly  greetings ! 

With  April  6  the  journal  ends ;  Marquette  became 
pitifully  weak.  He  headed  northward  and  made 
feeble  efforts  to  get  to  Mackinac;  but  his  illness  (and 
one  is  deeply  sympathetic  on  learning  that  it  was 
stomach  trouble)  held  him  back;  and  on  May  18,  on 
the  shore  of  Lake  Michigan,  where  now  stands  the 
city  of  Ludington,  he  died. 

As  nearly  as  can  be  ascertained,  the  spot  where 
Marquette  lived  in  the  bitter  winter  that  was  the  last 
winter  of  his  life,  was  at  what  is  now  the  junction 
of  the  Drainage  Canal  with  the  Chicago  River,  at 
the  foot  of  Robey  Street.  The  neighborhood  may  be 
reached  by  the  Blue  Island  Avenue  trolley,  the  cars 
going  through  miles  of  two-story  shabbiness,  with 
hardly  a  blade  of  grass,  hardly  a  tree,  to  be  seen,  not 
a  park  to  relieve  the  dreariness  of  miles,  and  with 
other  miles,  likewise  suggesting  dreariness  of  aspect, 
stretching  off  on  either  side.  And  this  portion  of 
the  city  is  essentially  Chicago,  quite  as  much  as  the 
portions  of  beauty  and  grandeur;  it  represents  a 
dour  and  bitter  and  unhappy  Chicago.  In  one  quar- 
ter is  noticed  from  the  car  window,  a  long  line  of 
junk-shops,  with  barrels  and  bottles  and  rubber  and 
brass  and  feathers  and  bones — a  shivery  lot.  At 
length  you  get  into  a  district  skirting  a  manufactur- 
ing and  shipping  region,  and  then,  soon,  you  are  at 

272 


A  MARQUETTE  CROSS 

Robey  Avenue,  where  you  leave  the  car  and  walk  a 
mile  to  the  southward,  along  a  public  street  occupied 
by  railway  tracks,  and  with  no  sidewalks  except,  for 
part  of  the  distance,  boards  laid  in  mud. 

There  are  railway  cars,  factories,  close-piled  lum- 
ber, planing  mills,  and,  odd  and  interesting,  cutters 
of  veneer.  A  veneer  cutting  company  has  a  yard 
piled  with  huge  logs,  squared,  from  thirty  to  fifty 
inches  square !  The  logs  are  seasoning  out  of  doors 
but  are  preciously  covered  with  great  strips  of  bark 
and  protective  planking.  They  are  mahogany; 
queer-looking  mahogany,  from  Africa,  logs  very 
dark,  some  with  what  seem  hieroglyphics  on  the 
ends ;  and  you  picture  them  handled  by  the  slaves  of 
the  Congo. 

The  monument  cross  stands  beside  the  water  in 
what  was  intended  to  be  a  tiny  park.  The  water  of 
the  river  flows  backward,  with  current  steady  and 
full.  A  miracle,  the  pious  Marquette  would  have 
held  it  to  be ;  and  it  is ! 

On  a  base  of  three  diminishing  levels  of  concrete, 
forming  steps  from  all  four  sides,  stands  the  Mar- 
quette Cross,  in  somber  dignity.  It  is  fourteen  feet 
high,  and  of  wood — perhaps,  when  one  thinks  of  it,  a 
cross  really  ought  to  be  of  wood — but  such  wood! 
Black,  sombrous,  impressive ;  and  it  is  of  the  mahog- 
any from  Africa.  The  immediate  surroundings  are 
lonely.  The  water  is  dark  and  gloomy.  There  is 
no  path  to  the  monument.  It  is  in  nobody's  way. 
Yet  a  previous  cross  of  wood  was  sawed  down  and 
carried  off,  and  an  iron  cross  was  overthrown  by  a 

273 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

switch-engine,  which  barely  missed  going  into  the 
water  in  doing  it,  and  another  iron  cross  was  cut 
down  with  a  hack-saw  and  disappeared.  And  now 
the  cross  is  made  again  of  wood,  but  of  this  black 
and  heavy  wood,  and  its  edges  are  bound  with  tool 
steel,  so  tough  that  a  hack-saw  cannot  touch  it,  and 
the  steel  is  fastened  with  countersunk  steel  screws. 

How  long,  long  ago  it  all  seems !  And  how  long, 
long  ago  it  all  was !  Here  lived  Father  Marquette, 
here  came  "the  surgeon,"  here  came  the  visiting 
Indians,  bearing  gifts. 

And  the  days  of  the  Indians  might  be  but  yester- 
day, if  one  were  to  judge  from  the  city  maps ;  for  the 
latest  map  still  marks,  partly  within  the  city  limits, 
at  the  northwest,  and  partly  stretching  outside,  a 
tract  of  sixteen  hundred  acres  described  as  "  Billy 
Caldwell's  Indian  Reserve";  Billy  having  been  a 
half  breed  whose  title  was  not  extinguished  when 
those  of  the  Indians  were  done  away  with,  he  being 
held  to  be  white.  His  tract  was  until  very  recently 
quite  unbroken,  and  even  yet  is  practically  so. 

And  diagonally  across  the  southern  part  of  the 
city,  crossing  Lake  Calumet  on  its  way,  is  what  is 
termed  an  " Indian  Boundary  Line." 

And  it  is  merely  an  odd  chance  which  makes  my 
eye  strike  among  some  advertisements — and  any  one 
who  would  understand  a  city  must  read  its  adver- 
tisements!— among  " positions  wanted,"  the  notice 
that  a  place  is  desired  by  a  "neat  American  In- 
dian"; and  he  wants  a  position  as  chauffeur;  thus 
far  present-day  conditions  having  led  him.  And  in 

274 


A  MAKQUETTE  CROSS 

this  same  newspaper  was  an  advertisement  of  an 
" Indian  Fellowship  League,"  announcing  that  "any 
person  of  the  white  or  red  race  is  eligible  to  mem- 
bership." Really,  a  foreigner  might  be  excused  for 
going  about  Chicago  preparing  to  dodge  tomahawk 
wielders. 

The  Marquette  Cross,  commemorative  as  it  is  of 
the  French  of  long  ago  in  Chicago,  brings  to  mind 
another  West  Side  connection  with  the  French ;  but 
here  the  French  of  recent  times.  For  one  day  I 
came  upon  the  church  of  ' '  Notre  Dame  de  Chicago ' ' : 
and  how  quaintly  delightful  was  the  unexpectedness 
of  the  name ! 

It  is  at  Oregon  Avenue  and  Sibley  Street,  and  may 
be  reached  by  the  Harrison  Street  trolley.  It  is  not 
a  rich  part  of  the  city;  from  appearances  it  never 
was  a  rich  section. 

The  interior  of  the  church  seemed  to  me  the  quiet- 
est place  in  Chicago;  so  curiously  and  almost  un- 
commonly quiet  it  was.  The  great  central  nave, 
rising  high  under  a  lofty  dome,  has  much  of  dull- 
ish chocolate  pink  in  walls  and  ceiling;  but  in  the 
stained  glass  windows,  including  two  huge  Gothic 
wheel  windows,  and  around  the  main  altar,  itself  of 
white  marble,  are  touches  of  green  and  blue  and  or- 
ange and  maroon,  albeit  extremely  florid;  and  the 
exterior  of  the  building  shows  as  a  great  domed  mass 
of  mellowed  yellow  brick. 

Every  Sunday  there  are  services  in  French;  and 
the  church  represents  an  important  coming  in  of 
French  Canadians,  likely  enough  descended  from  the 

275 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

old  couriers  de  bois  whose  canoes  came  out  as  far  as 
this,  and  farther,  years  and  years  ago,  although  they 
have  been  quietly  living  in  Quebec  for  many  and 
many  a  year. 

Around  the  corner  from  "  Notre  Dame  de  Chi- 
cago" I  came,  with  entire  unexpectedness,  upon  the 
church  of  "Our  Lady  of  Pompeii";  a  modern  and 
unattractive  building,  but  interesting  from  contrast 
with  the  church  of  the  French  close  by. 

The  Italians  have  come  to  Chicago  in  swarms ;  and 
not  far  from  "Our  Lady  of  Pompeii"  one  finds  a 
"Gaffe  della  Grotta  Azzurra" — this  reminder  of 
Capri  and  its  azure  grotto  being  in  a  neighborhood 
now  dirty  and  squalid.  And  near  by  is  wonderful 
Halsted  Street,  that  thoroughfare  of  many  nations, 
with  its  more  than  twenty  miles  of  little  stores.  Ital- 
ian signs  are  frequent,  and  in  particular  I  noticed 
the  Banca  de  Napoli ;  with  the  proud  boast  lettered 
upon  its  front:  "II  piu'  antico  institu  del  mondo" 
— the  oldest  bank  in  the  world ;  and,  indeed,  the  home 
house  was  founded  in  1539. 

De  Koven  Street  is  at  no  great  distance;  and  it 
was  there  that  the  Great  Fire  began.  To  commem- 
orate the  spot  where  the  fire  started  a  tablet  has  been 
placed  on  the  front  of  the  building,  number  558, 
which  stands  in  front  of  the  site  of  Mrs.  O'Leary's 
barn,  but  the  house  is  not  the  original  house,  and  the 
tablet  is  inadvertently  misleading  as  to  this. 

It  is  a  neighborhood  of  rear  tenements  and  out- 
side wooden  stairs,  and  wooden  sheds,  and  narrow 
passages  between  buildings,  and  yards  that  are  much 

276 


A  MARQUETTE  CROSS 

below  the  sidewalk,  this  being  one  of  the  regions  in 
which,  although  the  level  of  the  city  has  been  raised, 
as  to  streets  and  sidewalks,  many  of  the  property 
owners  have  never  filled  in  their  own  land. 

There  is  much  in  the  neighborhood  to  give  a  sense 
of  drab  despair,  especially  from  debris  and  litter  and 
mud;  but  it  is  a  March  aspect  that  I  have  in  mind, 
when  the  region  was  looking  its  worst  and  where 
here  and  there  a  tottering  wooden  house  on  rotting 
wooden  foundations  seemed  more  decayed  'and  tot- 
tering than  usual.  But  much  of  the  West  Side  is  of 
dreariness,  in  contrast  with  its  many  streets  of  com- 
fort and  happiness.  And  as  to  the  undesirable  por- 
tions, some  of  which  are  menaces  to  the  city's  health, 
Chicago,  ostrich-like,  puts  her  head  in  the  sands  of 
the  Lake  Front  and  Lincoln  Park  and  imagines  these 
other  regions  hidden  and  harmless. 

The  Great  Fire  began  on  an  October  night.  There 
had  been  a  dry  and  scorching  summer.  The  wooden 
houses  and  sheds  were  baked  to  an  infinite  dryness. 
A  man  and  his  wife,  named  O'Leary,  owned  the 
house  and  barn  behind  it.  Part  of  the  house  was 
sublet  to  another  family,  who  that  night  had  a  gay 
time  with  some  friends.  In  the  barn  were  a  horse 
and  half  a  dozen  cows. 

A  terrific  gale  was  blowing  when  the  fire  began. 
There  is  no  reasonable  doubt,  there  is  really  no  doubt 
at  all,  that  it  was  a  case  of  Mrs.  0  'Leary  and  an  over- 
turned lamp.  But  naturally,  the  O'Learys  them- 
selves tried  to  escape  the  terrible  blame.  At  nine 
o'clock  the  alarm  was  given.  With  such  incredible 

277 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

speed  did  the  fire  go  that  in  less  than  an  hour  the  en- 
tire city  was  threatened.  At  ten  o'clock  the  court- 
house bell  began  to  toll  a  general  alarm,  and  it  sol- 
emnly boomed  for  four  hours,  till  the  fire  seized 
upon  the  building.  The  dreadful  destruction,  the 
panic-stricken  throngs,  the  frantic  efforts  to  save 
life  and  the  hopeless  effort  to  save  property,  the 
miles  of  fire,  destroying  everything  in  its  path,  even 
the  strongest  and  supposedly  fireproof  buildings, 
the  miles  of  fire-swept  desolateness  when  the  fire  was 
over,  united  to  make  a  tragedy  of  world  importance ; 
and  here  on  DeKoven  Street,  one  stands  at  the  spot 
where  it  began. 

On  the  great  West  Side,  organized  charity  goes  on 
its  well-organized  way.  Some  of  the  settlement 
houses  are  here ;  notably  Hull  House,  that  has  made 
its  name  widely  known,  and  that  of  its  founder,  Jane 
Addams,  who  modestly  began  the  work  some  thirty 
years  ago. 

An  aggregation  of  buildings  of  dull  red  brick,  oc- 
cupying the  space  between  Polk  Street  and  Gilpin 
Place,  on  Halsted  Street,  collectively  makes  Hull 
House. 

The  tone  of  the  place,  and  of  the  work  that  was  to 
be  done  in  the  place,  seems  to  have  been  set,  uncon- 
sciously, by  the  use  of  the  name  of  "Hull";  for  it 
glorifies  nobody ;  it  was  entirely  without  pretension ; 
it  was  merely  that  a  man  named  Hull  had  owned  the 
house  that  was  bought  for  the  beginning  of  the  work. 

The  old  house  (old,  for  Chicago,  probably  having 
been  built  about  1860)  still  exists,  though  not  in- 

278 


LIBRARY 

OF  THE 

UNIVERSITY  OF  ILLINOIS 


A  MARQUETTE  CROSS 

stantly  to  be  picked  out  from  the  mass  by  the  casual 
observer.  And  the  treatment  of  that  house  displays, 
again,  an  attractive  spirit.  The  rooms,  big  and 
square,  might  have  been  given  a  barren  and  public 
aspect,  but  instead,  as  you  enter,  you  find  that  there 
has  been  such  treatment  as  to  give  a  homelike  air, 
with  pervasiveness  of  a  soft  and  intimate  patina- 
like  green.  There  is  furniture  of  the  period  of  the 
house,  and  some  still  older.  There  are  great  old 
sofas  and  likable  pictures.  The  dining-room  is 
highly  attractive.  And  outside  is  a  courtyard,  with 
effects,  in  the  moonlight,  almost  mediaeval,  with  the 
soft  light  shining  on  gables  and  stone  balustrades 
and  mullioned  windows  and  a  terrace  which  looks 
very  far  away  and  foreign:  for  the  buildings  that 
have  been  built  around  the  nucleus  have  been  pleas- 
antly planned,  and  always  with  a  studied  simplicity, 
with  gables  stone-edged  or  of  brick,  and  with  quoined 
corners,  and  diamond-panes,  and  a  balcony  above  a 
triple-arched  arcade ;  and  all  without  attempt  at  or- 
nateness  or  ostentation.  In  one  of  the  newest  build- 
ings is  an  assembly  hall,  with  dark-wood  paneling, 
plain  and  austere,  and  Tudor-like  windows,  and  walls 
rough-surfaced  in  gold  and  brown,  and  a  gallery, 
plain  yet  remindful  of  the  musicians '  gallery  in  some 
banqueting  hall  of  old.  It  is  one  of  the  most  digni- 
fied assembly  halls  that  I  ever  entered,  and  leaves  an 
impression,  simple  though  it  is,  somewhat  akin  to 
that  of  the  Salone,  in  Padua,  and  of  one  or  two  an- 
cient monastic  refectory  halls  elsewhere  in  Italy. 
And  it  is  illustrative  of  Hull  House,  that  even  this 

279 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

hall  is  not  too  fine  to  be  used;  everything  in  Hull 
House  is  for  use !  And  not  long  ago,  the  hall  was 
filled  and  emptied  four  times  in  one  single  evening, 
so  that  four  separate  throngs  might  see  and  hear  a 
woman  from  Russia  who  was  looked  upon,  by  those 
of  her  own  race,  as  a  deliverer. 

The  work  of  Hull  House  has  broadened  out  into 
many  channels,  making  it  quite  the  best-known  set- 
tlement house  of  the  world,  and  the  original  head  is 
still  its  head.  Miss  Addams  would  be  surprised  to 
be  compared  with  Locke's  " Beloved  Vagabond"; 
yet  that  unique  character,  when  in  doubt  and  trouble, 
went  to  the  statue  of  Henri  Quatre  and  believed 
that  he  got  it  from  some  necessary  inspiration ;  and 
Miss  Addams  has  told  that,  in  the  dark  days  of  1894, 
when  traffic  was  tied  up  by  strikes  and  Federal 
troops  were  in  charge  in  Chicago  although  their 
presence  was  resented  by  both  city  and  State,  and 
when  there  was  gloomy  trouble  threatening  Hull 
House,  which  had  then  not  much  more  than  begun, 
she  walked  (as  no  cars  were  running)  the  long  dis- 
tance to  Lincoln  Park  * '  in  order  to  look  at  and  gain 
magnanimous  counsel,  if  I  might,  from  the  mar- 
velous St.  Gaudens  statue  of  Lincoln." 

At  Hull  House,  as  at  other  places,  it  is  often  the 
unexpected  that  happens,  as  was  the  case  at  the 
close  of  a  meeting  which  had  been  addressed  by  a 
rich  woman,  exquisitely  gowned.  "Now,"  she  said 
in  conclusion,  "ask  me  any  question  that  occurs  to 
you."  There  was  a  diffident  silence.  "Don't  hesi- 
tate. Just  ask  me  any  question  which  occurs  to 

280 


A  MARQUETTE  CROSS 

you."  Whereupon  a  woman  breathlessly  stam- 
mered, ' '  Please  tell  me  where  you  get  your  corsets ' ' ! 

The  West  Side  holds  within  its  far-flung  bounds 
immense  numbers  of  foreigners,  and  it  is  in  these 
regions  that  so  many  live,  with  their  own  centers  of 
business  and  pleasure,  that  they  seldom  if  ever  get 
to  the  Loop  and  never  have  had  a  glimpse  of  Lake 
Michigan ! 

There  is  more  than  a  population  of  foreigners. 
For  example  there  are  a  number  of  great  hospitals 
that  have  established  themselves  in  a  group  on  the 
West  Side,  and  you  will  not  be  surprised  to  know 
that  it  is  "the  greatest  group  of  hospitals  in  the 
world,"  as  I  think  it  really  is. 

Certain  portions  of  the  West  Side  are  still  pleas- 
urably  remembered  by  people  who,  as  children,  lived 
there  when  those  sections  were  lived  in  to  some  ex- 
tent by  "  exclusives. "  And  there  are  still  many 
houses  of  size  and  comfort.  And  on  Ashland 
Avenue,  one  of  the  oldest  of  Chicago  streets,  laid  out 
even  before  it  became  a  city,  the  first  Mayor  Harri- 
son made  his  home.  But  West  Side  "exclusive- 
ness"  was  overborn  by  the  South  Side,  just  as  the 
South  Side  has  since  yielded  prestige  before  the  ad- 
vances of  the  North  Side. 

But  it  is  for  its  great  foreign  sections  that  the 
West  Side  is  now  generally  known.  And  at  one 
of  the  large  settlement  houses,  not  far  from  Hull 
House,  it  was  thrilling  to  hear,  in  a  big  hall  packed 
with  the  children  of  foreigners,  the  enthusiastic 
"Tramp,  tramp,  tramp!  The  boys  are  marching!" 

281 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

And  when,  at  the  end  of  the  verse,  the  children  were 
told  that  the  song  had  been  written  by  a  Chicagoan, 
they  went  at  the  next  verse  with  intensity  of  en- 
thusiasm. They  had  caught  the  spirit  of  Chicago ! 

The  West  Side  has,  of  course,  its  " Death  Cor- 
ner," and  its  "Little  Italy, "  where  the  life  and 
habits  and  superstitions  and  language  are  of  a  veri- 
table Italy,  except  that  the  low  houses  of  frame  are 
very  different  from  the  tall  stucco  houses  of  Italy. 
There  are  a  few  Chinese,  but,  small  though  their 
numbers  are,  they  have  the  faculty  of  making  their 
little  section  a  place  different  and  apart.  They 
were,  until  recent  years,  on  Clark  near  Van  Buren, 
and  a  vague  Oriental  touch  still  lingers  upon  the 
buildings  that  they  have  left.  But  now  they  center 
on  the  West  Side,  in  a  little  section  at  Wentworth 
and  Twenty-second  Streets.  And  their  passive 
silence,  their  unfathomableness,  their  plum-colored 
or  blue  tunics,  their  dark  clogs  with  twinkling  white 
soles,  are  already 'giving  a  tinge  of  orientalism  to 
that  highly  un-Chinese  section,  with  its  railroad 
tracks  and  its  vacant  lots  and  its  unattractive  build- 
ings. Chinese  homes  never  catch  fire ;  or  so  seldom 
as  to  seem  never ;  and  this  is  fortunate,  for  the  frame 
buildings  of  their  present  region  show,  markedly, 
what  one  sees  in  much  of  Chicago,  wooden  galleries, 
extending  the  length  of  several  houses,  with  wooden 
stairways  connecting  the  galleries,  and  reaching 
down  as  fire-escapes.  And  this  is  a  city  that  has 
peculiarly  suffered  from  fire! 

The  West  Side  has  its  so-called  Ghetto,  and  at 

282 


A  MARQUETTE  CROSS 

a  Sunday  forenoon  market,  centering  on  broad  Max- 
well Street  between  Halsted  and  Jefferson,  the 
Ghetto  dweller  may  be  picturesquely  seen.  Then 
the  street  is  packed  and  jammed  with  carts  and 
boxes  and  stands,  loaded  with  every  variety  of  cloth- 
ing, new  and  old;  and  one  wonders  where  so  many 
second-hand  derby  hats  can  possibly  come  from! 
There  is  cloth  in  every  shade  of  green  and  blue  and 
orange  and  red  and  purple  and  maroon;  for  these 
are  color  loving  folk.  There  is  every  variety  of 
household  utensil.  There  are  dresses  and  jackets, 
and  piles  of  cloth  heaped  directly  upon  the  concrete 
pavement,  and  other  piles  on  boards  or  paper.  It 
is  the  most  colorful  street  in  Chicago,  bright,  bril- 
liant, with  every  variety  of  glow.  Even  the  men, 
and  more  particularly  the  women,  wear  caps  and 
jackets  delectable  of  hue,  in  fetching  greens  (par- 
ticularly greens)  and  olives  and  reds  and  blues. 
These  many  colors  moving  animatedly  about  among 
the  piles  of  every-hued  merchandise  make  a  scene 
of  kaleidoscopic  activity.  There  is  food  in  boxes 
and  trays:  beans  and  peas  and  coffee,  fish,  fruit 
and  vegetables,  the  bright  yellow  of  oranges,  the 
bright  green  of  cabbages,  all  adding  to  the  varie- 
gated colors.  There  are  crates  of  fowl,  there  are 
guinea  hens,  awed  for  once  into  silence,  there  are 
chickens  in  variety  of  color.  Always  color!  With 
always  a  curious  chirring  murmur  from  the  ambu- 
latory throng. 

One  is  likely,  through  looking  on  at  a  market  as 
at  a  show,  to  think  that  it  must  be  just  a  show  to 

283 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

the  participators.  But  I  remember  a  night  market, 
also  a  street  market,  of  the  Ghetto  folk,  when  there 
was  rain,  and  drizzly  dripping  snow,  and  misery. 
The  street  lights  seemed  somehow  to  be  poorer  than 
usual.  One  noted  sinister-seeming  passages  leading 
off  into  darkness.  The  dealers,  men  and  women, 
stood  in  persistent  misery,  every  one  wanting  to 
quit,  but  every  one  hoping  for  one  more  sale. 

The  magnificent  boulevard  system,  sweeping 
through  all  the  sections  of  the  city,  cuts  its  broad 
swath  through  this  West  Side  as  well  as  through 
the  show  parts  of  the  city;  but  it  is  well  seen  to 
that  those  who  motor  on  the  forty  miles  of  boule- 
vard of  which  the  city  is  so  justly  proud,  do  not  see 
the  undesirable. 

The  West  Side  has,  too,  some  highly  attractive 
parks;  and  one  of  them,  Garfield  Park,  claims  to 
have  the  largest  conservatory  and  the  rarest  col- 
lection of  orchids  in  the  United  States.  It  also  has 
an  unusual  collection  of  ferns,  and  many  brilliant- 
hued  tropical  plants. 

Here,  one  day — at  least,  so  they  will  tell  you— 
an  obviously  rich  woman  came  in  and,  looking 
around,  became  fascinated  by  the  names  that  she 
saw  upon  the  plants. 

"They  are — Latin  names?" 

"Yes,  madam. " 

Encouraged  by  her  success  she  continued:  "And 
have  all  the  flowers  Latin  names?" 

"Yes,  madam." 

"Even  the  little  simple  flowers'?" 

284 


A  MAEQUETTE  CROSS 

"Yes,  madam." 

Then,  with  a  gentle  smile  of  rumination:    "Ain't 
nature  wonderful!" 


285 


CHAPTER  XX 


OUT  IN   THE   SUBURBS 

INGULARLY  enough, 
the  mud  of  early 
Chicago,  so  long  ago 
done  away  with,  had  a 
great  deal  to  do  with 
the  life  and  the  location  of 
the  home  of  Frances  Wil- 
lard.  Her  father  migrated 
westward,  with  his  family, 
from  New  York  State,  three 
quarters  of  a  century  ago,  she 
being  then  a  mere  child.  But  child  though  she  was, 
she  was  deeply  impressed  by  the  mud  of  early 
Chicago ;  she  never  forgot  it ;  its  memory  vividly  re- 
mained. Where  there  ought  to  have  been  roads,  in 
the  region  approaching  the  new  city,  there  were 
ominous  signs  of  "No  bottom";  there  had  been 
heavy  rains,  making  what  seemed  the  hopelessly 
swampy  regions  still  more  hopeless;  it  was  an  ex- 
ceptionally bad  period  in  a  bad  season  of  those  early 
days  without  macadam,  and  her  father  edged  his 
canvas-topped  emigrant's  wagon  away  from  the 
place  which,  had  it  not  been  for  its  mud,  would  have 

286 


OUT  IN  THE  SUBURBS 

become  his  home.  He  strained  every  nerve  in  aim- 
ing for  dryer  roads  and  a  safer  region,  until,  with 
infinite  trouble,  he  worked  into  safety,  whereupon 
he  continued  in  his  search  for  dry  roads,  until  he 
was  over  the  border  of  the  State  and  found  himself 
in  Wisconsin,  and  made  a  home  there. 

But  fate  was  to  make  Frances  Willard  a 
Chicagoan  in  spite  of  the  mud;  for  when  she  be- 
came old  enough,  her  father  sent  her  to  Chicago 
for  an  education ;  or,  at  least,  he  sent  her  to  Evans- 
ton,  which  has  always  been  looked  upon  as  part  of 
Chicago,  although  never  actually  acquired  by  the 
insatiable  city.  Frances  Willard  was  given  a  col- 
lege education  at  Evanston,  in  that  faraway  time 
when,  for  a  woman,  a  college  education  was  looked 
upon  as  a  distinction — and  perhaps,  by  many,  a 
doubtful  one! 

It  is  probable  that  her  life  would  have  been  more 
of  a  loving  home  life  than  one  of  public  distinc- 
tion, had  she  not  been  faced  with  a  bitter  disap- 
pointment. For  she  fell  in  love,  fell  in  love  with 
intensity;  and  when  disappointment  came,  with  its 
wreck  of  promised  happiness,  it  threatened  to  wreck 
her  life  through  her  capacity  for  feeling.  But  she 
had  will-power  as  well  as  feeling,  and  pulled  her- 
self together,  and  put  away  all  thought  of  marriage, 
and,  facing  life  from  a  new  angle,  decided  to  adopt 
the  noble  career  of  teaching;  and  as  a  teacher  she 
was  a  splendid  influence  upon  those  fortunate 
enough  to  be  in  her  classes.  The  Northwestern 
University,  of  Evanston,  made  her  formally  a  pro- 

287 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

fessor,  and  then  selected  her  to  be  the  dean  of  its 
Woman's  College. 

But,  for  a  second  time,  her  life  career  was 
changed.  One  day  in  1874  she  saw  a  party  of  well- 
dressed  women  kneeling  in  front  of  a  saloon,  in 
Chicago;  and  she  listened  and  inquired  and 
pondered ;  and  soon  she  herself  was  one  of  a  kneel- 
ing band. 

For  the  kneeling  women  were  the  Crusaders  of 
that  striking  and  even  romantic  movement  which, 
throughout  the  land,  took  women,  rich  and  poor 
alike,  to  march  to  saloons  and  strive,  with  prayers 
and  singing,  to  move  the  hearts  of  saloon-keepers 
and  their  customers.  Almost  forgotten  though  it 
now  is,  the  remarkable  movement  swept  the  land, 
and,  reaching  Chicago,  achieved  its  greatest  and 
most  unexpected  triumph  in  the  winning  of  Frances 
Willard  for  leadership  in  the  prohibition  cause :  and 
in  time  she  became  a  mighty  force,  as  president  of 
the  Woman's  Christian  Temperance  Union,  and 
founder  and  president  of  the  World's  Christian 
Temperance  Union. 

Miss  Willard  stood  also,  and  strongly,  for 
woman  suffrage,  in  that  long  ago  time,  which  is 
really  so  recent  as  national  affairs  go;  and  hosts 
of  people  will  remember  a  most  impressive  argu- 
ment that  was  used  at  the  Chicago  World's  Fair. 
It  was  a  large  placard,  placed  prominently — I  think 
it  was  in  the  Woman's  Building — with  a  plainly 
lettered  sign  reading:  "The  Disfranchised  Classes," 
and  above  this  line  four  pictures:  one,  that  of  an 

288 


OUT  IN  THE  SUBURBS 

idiot,  one  of  a  criminal,  one  of  an  Indian,  and  the 
fourth,  the  fine  womanly  cultured  face  of  Miss 
Willard.  I  think  that  practically  every  visitor  to 
the  Fair,  whether  or  not  ready  to  be  a  woman  suf- 
fragist, carried  away  a  vivid  impression  of  that 
pictured  argument,  whose  force  was  due  to  the  fine 
womanliness  of  the  face  of  Miss  Willard. 

The  Evanston  region,  which  developed  Miss 
Willard,  developed  also  Myrtle  Reed,  who  won  a 
great  following  for  her  books,  whose  sweetish 
sentimental  qualities  attracted  readers  of  a  certain 
order  of  mind.  She  lived  in  Edgewater,  a  trifle 
northwest  of  Evanston,  in  a  place  called  "Para- 
dise Flat,"  but  the  end  of  her  well-meant  life  was 
unhappy  and  tragic. 

Chicagoans  are  enthusiastically,  even  vehemently, 
laudatory  of  their  own  suburbs.  They  do  not  hesi- 
tate to  declare  that  there  never  were  such  wonder- 
fully beautiful  suburbs  of  any  other  city,  ancient  or 
modern,  foreign  or  American.  They  do  not,  one 
notices,  err  on  the  side  of  moderation.  Yet  it  might 
be  remarked  that,  after  all,  of  Chicago  suburbs  there 
are  very  few,  the  city  having  so  enthusiastically 
adopted  the  policy  of  annexation,  and  having  so 
built  its  homes,  within  the  city  limits,  as  to  give 
to  the  excellent  residential  portions  of  the  city  what 
may  be  termed  a  suburban  character.  The  city  is 
so  much  a  city  of  homes,  with  a  grassy  space  around 
each  house  in  the  more  fortunate  regions,  and  with 
at  least  an  open  space,  even  though  perhaps  used 
for  debris  and  ashes,  beside  many  a  home  in  other 

289 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

regions,  that  it  does  not  greatly  need  suburbs. 
What  the  people  of  other  cities  go  to  their  suburbs 
to  secure — spaciousness  and  air — Chicago  has  with- 
in her  corporate  limits.  But  she  has,  also,  suburbs 
of  a  great  deal  of  attractiveness,  and  with  much  of 
composed  and  charming  living. 

Evanston  is  really  a  continuation  of  the  city,  and 
at  first  impresses  one  as  not  being  noticeably  differ- 
ent from  the  city,  but  after  a  while  one  comes  to 
realize  that  it  has  an  individuality  all  its  own,  and 
a  general  aspect  as  of  churchliness ;  and  I  noticed 
three  church  spires  close  enough  together  to  be  re- 
mindful (although  not  otherwise  similar  to  the 
English  spires)  of  the  three  which  inspired  Tenny- 
son to  make  poetry  out  of  "waiting  for  the  train 
at  Coventry." 

Evanston  gives  such  an  impression  of  quiet  that 
it  was  interesting  to  read,  after  the  Armistice,  a 
telegram  from  Washington  which  stated  that,  closely 
hidden  and  guarded,  somewhere  at  the  capital,  was 
a  tiny  vial  of  the  deadliest  poison  ever  known, 
which  was  perfected  just  as  the  Armistice  was 
shown,  otherwise  it  would  have  caused  hitherto  un- 
dreamt-of devastation  in  the  destruction  of  entire 
armies  and  populations;  and  this  poison,  thus  as- 
serted to  be  the  deadliest  of  all  poisons,  was  stated 
to  be  the  invention  of  a  professor  in  the  university  at 
Evanston. 

And  was  it  not  from  Evanston  that  a  frantic  mes- 
sage went  to  the  postmaster  of  Chicago  a  few  years 
ago,  signed  by  a  woman's  name  and  begging  that  he 

290 


OUT  IN  THE  SUBURBS 

hold  till  her  arrival  two  letters  which  the  telegram 
described? — the  telegram  being  promptly  followed 
by  a  highly  excited  young  woman,  who  breathlessly 
explained  that  she  had  had  two  proposals  of  mar- 
riage by  letter,  and  had  answered  them  by  the  same 
mail,  and  feared  that  she  had  got  the  letters  in  the 
wrong  envelopes! 

A  short  series  of  towns  immediately  to  the  north 
of  Evanston,  are  associated  in  a  general  way  and 
in  the  general  mind  with  Evanston  itself,  including 
the  charming  Glencoe  and  Winnetka  and  Wilmette 
— Wilmette  having  its  name,  so  the  Wilmettians 
would  have  you  know,  from  a  Frenchman  named 
Ouilmette  who  lived  in  that  locality  in  1803,  and 
married  an  Indian  woman,  and  had  a  daughter  who 
married  the  first  Irishman  in  Chicago;  and  they 
still  preserve  his  name,  Michael  Welch.  The  village 
hall  of  Wilmette  is  in  the  form  of  a  little  Greek 
temple  and  is  most  excellently  done. 

One  who  is  acquainted  with  the  rocky  soil  and 
stone-walled  fields  of  the  suburban  regions  of 
Boston,  Philadelphia  and  New  York,  notices  the 
striking  absence  of  stone  hereabouts.  I  was  taken 
by  the  owner  of  a  particularly  attractive  lakeside 
home,  to  see  a  rock  in  the  garden,  which  with  diffi- 
culty and  pride  had  been  acquired  and  was  the  envy 
of  the  neighbors ;  and  the  honored  object  was  about 
the  size  of  a  bushel  basket. 

Lake  Forest,  near  these  very  attractive  suburbs, 
is  mostly  inhabited,  so  it  is  said,  by  the  extremely 
rich;  and  you  are  told  that  one  of  them  spent  mil- 

291 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

lions  of  dollars  upon  his  estate,  and — such  being  one 
of  the  methods  of  measuring  financial  greatness-? 
that  "he  has  five  separate  telephones." 

A  little  to  the  north  of  these  suburbs,  all  of  which 
are  upon  the  Lake  Michigan  front  or  very  close  to 
it,  are  Fort  Sheridan  and  the  Great  Lakes  Train- 
ing Station;  this  latter  having  capacity  for  forty- 
five  thousand  men,  but  with  no  place  provided  for 
even  a  single  boat.  However,  the  station  has  a  re- 
markable record  of  a  vast  number  of  men  efficiently 
trained,  in  spite  of  this  great  handicap.  Men  who 
were  trained  here  had  to  be  carried  in  motor  trucks 
to  Waukegan  before  they  could  embark  on  Lake 
Michigan;  Waukegan  (its  name  calling  attention 
to  the  free  use  of  the  active  "walky"  in  names  of 
this  region;  as,  Waukesha,  Milwaukee,  Pewaukee, 
Waukegan)  being  a  manufacturing  town,  still 
farther  north,  which  retains,  in  spite  of  its  steel 
mill  development,  a  number  of  houses  which  are 
unusually  old  for  this  region,  with  hints  of  quaint 
old-fashionedness. 

With  the  idea  of  preparedness  for  a  possible  next 
war,  Chicago  is  now  urging  Congress  for  large  ap- 
propriations for  the  purpose  of  making  the  great 
but  harborless  training  station  a  naval  station  in 
fact,  by  building  a  fine  harbor  there. 

Zion  City  may  be  mentioned,  among  suburbs, 
though  its  people  were  never  suburbanites  in  any 
suburban  sense,  but  held  themselves  strictly  aloof 
from  Chicago.  It  was  Dowie  who  founded  this  Zion 
City,  and  made  it  famous;  John  Alexander  Dowie, 

292 


OUT  IN  THE  SUBURBS 

a  Scotchman  who  traveled  over  pretty  much  all  the 
world  and  established  Zion  here  in  the  early  1890 's. 
He  built  a  tabernacle,  \vhlch  he  declared  to  be  the 
largest  building  in  the  United  States  devoted  exclu- 
sively to  religious  worship.  He  established  lace- 
making  and  other  industries.  He  made  himself  a 
severe  dictator  for  his  town,  forbidding  even  smok- 
ing. He  made  a  religious  and  industrial  center; 
but  he  died;  and  the  importance  of  Zion  City  has 
waned. 

And  still  farther  to  the  northward,  and  perhaps 
too  far  away  to  be  classed  literally  among  suburbs, 
is  charming  and  much-loved  Lake  Geneva,  and  be- 
fore me  is  a  description  by  a  Chicago  woman  whose 
summer  home  is  beside  it!  "A  long  lake  with 
deeply-dented  shores  that  slope  into  its  shining 
waters.  A  lake  which  captivated  us."  The  list  of 
flowers  and  birds  is  amazing,  and  one  of  the  joys 
of  charming  country  living  is  found  to  be  "to  take 
possession  of  the  sunrises  and  the  starlit  nights. ' ' 

Although  the  principal  suburbs  are  to  the  north- 
ward, there  are  towns  of  pleasant  living  toward  the 
west,  and  there  are  also  towns  to  the  southward, 
such  as  Blue  Island,  important  as  an  active  manu- 
facturing and  railway  center,  and  worth  while,  also, 
as  the  place  where,  following  a  town  ordinance,  a 
newspaper  announced  that  "Hereafter  it  will  be  un- 
lawful for  persons  to  be  on  the  street  after  eight 
o'clock  without  their  tail  lights  burning." 

There  is  a  very  real  sentiment  for  suburbs,  among 
Chicagoans,  in  spite  of  the  fact  that  most  of  them 

293 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

do  not  live  in  suburbs.  Although  such  a  thoroughly 
practical  folk,  most  of  them  have  a  deep  sentiment 
for  things  of  out  of  doors.  As  I  heard  a  distin- 
guished Chicagoan,  an  apartment  dweller,  express 
it,  with  a  sincerity  which  took  away  petulance: 
*  'I  want  a  home  in  the  country.  I  want  to  be  carried 
out  of  my  own  door  when  I  die.  I  don't  want  to 
be  wheeled  out  on  a  tea-wagon!"  And  one  of 
George  Ade's  " Fables"  is  of  a  rich  business  man 
of  Chicago  who  wanted  to  quit  business  and  become 
a  gentleman  farmer  and  raise  chickens.  "He 
figured  how  many  Eggs  he  could  get  per  Hen,  and 
sometimes,  when  the  Pencil  was  working  well,  he 
estimated  that  he  could  make  the  Place  self-sup- 
porting. ' ' 

Paralleling  the  Evanston  region  is  a  north  and 
south  valley  known  as  the  Skokie.  It  is  a  wildish 
desolate  district,  with  marsh  and  stream  and 
pictorial  trees.  Artists  paint  pictures  of  the 
Skokie.  Young  poets  write  poems  about  the 
Skokie.  Plainer  citizens  tramp  along  the  Skokie. 
Golfers  play  beside  the  Skokie.  And  everybody 
wants  to  keep  it  untouched  by  modernity.  So, 
again  one  notices  the  possibilities  of  sentiment  in 
this  practical  city.  For  capitalists  have  freely 
given  their  names  in  promise  to  join  in  plans  of 
preservation,  and  the  city  itself  is  actually  preserv- 
ing considerable  part  of  the  region  and  will  probably 
get  more. 

The  love  of  Chicago  for  the  Skokie  is  remindful 
of  the  love  of  the  Philadelphian  for  the  Wissahickon ; 

294 


LIBRARY 

OF  THE 

UNIVERSITY  OF  ILLINOIS 


OUT  IN  THE  SUBURBS 

although  water  and  sky  are  perhaps  pretty  much 
all  the  two  valleys  have  in  common.  Chicago  nature 
lovers  speak  affectionately  of  the  Skokie  as  if  it  rep- 
resents the  Elysian  Fields.  They  bring  out  the 
name  with  a  loving  purr.  *  *  The  Skokie ! ' T  Strang- 
ers are  fascinated  by  the  word  and  by  the  general 
devotion.  One  city  dweller  tells  you,  as  if  it  were 
a  secret  of  sacredness,  that  the  lotus  grows  there. 
In  reality,  it  is  the  plain  friendly  yellow  water  lily. 
Another  informs  you  that  in  winter  time  there  is 
a  wonderful  warm  red-brown  color  on  the  Skokie. 
Another  declares  that  blue  herons,  five  feet  from 
tip  to  tip,  fly  commonly  over  the  Skokie. 

The  portions  of  the  region  that  have  been  secured 
by  the  city  are  to  be  part  of  a  development  alto- 
gether charming  and  unexpected.  For  Chicago 
possesses  Forest  Preserves ! — technically,  it  is  Cook 
County — partly  within  the  limits  of  the  city  and 
partly  just  outside. 

The  Forest  Preserves  thus  far  secured  amount  to 
over  fifteen  thousand  acres,  and  their  acreage  is 
increasing,  and  they  include  a  dozen  or  more  wild 
and  desirable  spots. 

The  general  plan  for  these  preserves  is  for  some- 
thing very  different  from  parks,  for  the  preserves 
are  to  be  without  formal  and  artificial  features. 
The  idea  is  to  preserve  the  wilderness  of  wild  and 
timbered  districts,  to  encourage  wild  game,  and  to 
stock  with  fish.  A  few  roads  will  be  cut  to  make 
some  places  accessible  that  now  cannot  be  reached, 
and  there  are  facilities  for  camping. 

295 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

The  Prairie  Club,  an  active  body,  has  organized 
a  system  of  walks,  to  explore  picturesque  regions, 
and  especially  to  follow  out  old  Indian  trails.  And 
I  noticed,  the  other  day,  an  item  in  a  newspaper,  a 
short  paragraph,  telling,  just  as  if  it  were  an 
ordinary  *and  quite  unpicturesque  fact,  that  the 
Prairie  Club  walk  for  the  next  day  would  be  led  by 
a  Chicago  woman  who  was  an  Indian  chief's 
daughter,  her  father  having  been  friendly  to  the 
whites  in  early  days,  and  she  herself  still  having 
her  home  on  land  given  to  her  father  by  the  Treaty 
of  Prairie  du  Chien. 


296 


CHAPTER  XXI 


THE  EXTRAORDINARY   MAKING   OF   GARY 

|  HE  making  of  the  city 
of  Gary  was  a  huge 
and  remarkable  achieve- 
ment.   And    its    name 
comes   from  that   of  a 
"f  man  who  was  born  in  the 
little  town  of  Wheaton  in 
Illinois,  twenty-five  miles 
west  of  Chicago. 

That  Wheaton  spent 
sixty  thousand  dollars  on 
its  water-works  is  the  out- 
standing financial  fact  connected  with  the  place,  as 
gleaned  from  a  recent  local  description  that  lies  be- 
fore me ;  the  far  more  important  financial  fact  being 
entirely  overlooked  that  Wheaton  was  the  birthplace 
of  Elbert  H.  Gary,  one  of  America's  greatest 
financiers,  who  for  years  displayed  his  grasp  of 
enormous  financial  problems  as  the  directing  spirit 
of  the  billion  dollar  steel  corporation,  the  greatest 
single  business  organization  in  the  world. 

After  staying  in  his  little  home  town  long  enough 
to  attain  prominence  there  and  the  titles  of  mayor 

297 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

and  judge,  he  naturally  gravitated  to  nearby 
Chicago  and,  as  a  lawyer,  showed  the  strong 
financial  bent  of  his  mind  by  beginning  to  give 
special  attention  to  problems  of  big  business;  be- 
fore long,  he  even  became  an  organizer  of  business ; 
and  at  length  he  ceased  to  be  a  Chicagoan  and  be- 
came a  New  Yorker.  Yet  he  still  felt  that  close 
ties  bound  him  to  Illinois  and  Chicago,  and  when 
it  was  suggested  that  the  great  steel  corporation 
was  in  need  of  new  facilities,  for  manufacturing  and 
shipping,  in  the  heart  of  the  Middle  West,  and  that 
on  the  whole  it  seemed  best  to  found  an  entirely  new 
town,  he  entered  into  the  project  with  joy:  for  was 
not  the  heart  of  the  Middle  West  the  neighborhood 
of  Chicago! 

A  place  was  needed  where  the  corporation  could 
build  great  steel  mills,  and  make  homes  for  many 
thousands  of  steel  workers  and  their  families.  In 
the  selection  of  the  site,  and  in  the  plans  and  ar- 
rangements for  the  new  place,  Elbert  Gary  showed 
such  constant  interest  and  gave  such  advice  and 
exercised  such  leadership,  that  his  business  as- 
sociates named  the  place  in  his  honor.  The  in- 
tended greatest  steel-making  center  was  to  be  known 
as  Gary. 

Gary  stands  where  most  people,  except  Chicago- 
ans  themselves,  think  that  Chicago  stands:  at 
the  southern  end  of  Lake  Michigan.  The  location 
was  selected  in  order  to  gain  real  geographical  ad- 
vantages, with  its  really  central  situation,  its  harbor 
possibilities,  its  possibilities  of  railway  connections, 

298 


THE  EXTEAOEDINAEY  MAKING  OF  GAEY 

the  ease  with  which  raw  material  could  be  gathered 
and  with  which  manufactured  products  could  be 
shipped.  Gary  is  so  completely  down  at  the  foot 
— or  head — of  the  lake — Lake  Michigan  stands  on 
its  head — that  it  is  actually  over  the  line  in  Indiana, 
suburb  of  Chicago  though  it  is.  It  is  only  twenty- 
six  miles  from  the  heart  of  the  great  city,  and 
reached  by  rail  down  beyond  the  Calumet  Lake 
region,  passing  an  oddly  dreary  district  where,  in 
spite  of  the  dreariness,  there  are  suggestions  of 
parts  of  Holland,  with  amphibious  houses  and 
amphibious-seeming  folk,  and  great  levels  of  alter- 
nate land  and  lake  and  canal  and  stream,  with  the 
water  brimming  to  the  verge,  and  with  boat  land- 
ings and  little  boats;  and  yet,  after  all,  with  but 
little  of  prettiness.  But  these  almost  picturesque 
amphibious  characteristics  vanish  before  the  city  of 
Gary  is  reached, 

Gary  was  begun  in  1906.  Almost  at  once,  so  it 
seemed,  a  population  of  thirty  thousand  was  at- 
tained, and  the  place  went  on  increasing,  with  the 
prophecy  that  by  1925  it  would  have  at  least  a  hun- 
dred thousand — toward  which  figure  it  is  well  on  its 
way  as  I  write. 

Enormous  steel  mills  went  up  as  if  by  magic,  and 
workmen  were  sent  by  thousands.  Their  families, 
too,  were  sent,  for  homes  went  up  as  the  mills 
went  up,  and  from  the  first  there  was  comfort  in 
family  living.  An  area  of  thirty  square  miles ;  one 
hundred  and  fifty  miles  of  water  and  gas  mains; 
street  pavement,  eighty  miles;  cement  sidewalks, 

299 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

one  hundred  and  twenty-five  miles :  such  are  among 
the  figures  that  are  given.  The  city  started,  un- 
hampered by  the  mistakes  of  past  generations. 

It  has  been  more  wonderful  than  even  the  making 
of  St.  Petersburg,  of  Petrograd.  For  Gary  was 
built  on  shifty  shifting  sand:  it  was  built  in  the 
sandy  dune  country.  It  was  set  up  in  a  bit  of 
savagery.  And  even  now,  in  spite  of  the  miles  of 
street  pavement  and  sidewalks,  in  spite  of  the  thou- 
sands of  orderly  homes  and  business  blocks,  the 
sand  is  all  about  and  in  between,  and  is  always  and 
vastly  threatening.  Let  a  householder  but  stir  with 
a  stick  in  his  back  yard,  on  a  windy  day,  and  the 
treacherous  sand  begins  to  move  and  cloud  and 
whirl.  And,  close  hemming  the  city,  are  areas  of 
sand,  shifting  and  blowing  and  always  threatening. 

And  the  fancy  comes,  that  if  the  people  were  to  be 
taken  away  for  a  little  while,  and  the  town  left  to 
itself,  it  would  be  blotted  out;  one  feels  that  its 
houses  would  become  hills  and  knolls  of  sand,  that 
its  streets,  now  thronged  by  day  and  brilliantly 
lighted  by  night,  would  become  sand  valleys,  that 
scrub-oaks  and  pines  would  begin  to  grow  here,  and 
that  the  city  of  Gary  would  vanish  from  sight  as 
magically  as  it  arose,  with  only  a  few  mill  chimneys 
standing  up  mysteriously  to  puzzle  wondering 
travelers,  until  even  those  last  signs  of  human  life 
should  rust  and  topple  and  disappear.  The 
imagination  is  moved  by  mystical  ancient  tales  of 
vanished  towns;  and,  also,  there  comes  to  mind  the 
humorous  wonder-tale  by  * '  Q, "  about  Perranzabuloe 

300 


THE  EXTRAORDINARY  MAKING  OF  GARY 

and  its  ever-shifting  sands,  and  of  how  Saint  Piran 
and  his  faithful  flock  lost  all  trace  of  their  church, 
which  had  become  a  sand  dune  and  was  hidden  from 
sight  under  their  very  eyes. 

An  amazing  feature  about  Gary,  built  as  it  is  on 
shifting  sands,  is  that  it  is  actually  so  solid,  so  per- 
manent, so  strong.  There  is  nothing  suggestive  of 
the  shoddy  or  the  temporary.  Schools,  libraries, 
clubs,  commercial  buildings,  homes,  churches,  meet- 
ing places,  all  have  the  aspect  as  of  having  been 
built  for  permanence.  The  city  has  arisen  so 
swiftly,  so  solidly,  just  because  a  great  corpora- 
tion ordered  it!  It  is  vastly  more  of  an  achieve- 
ment than  as  if  it  had  been  ordered  by  an  arbitrary 
monarch,  with  absolute  control  of  a  nation  and  of  its 
resources.  And  as  to  the  threatening  waves  of  sand 
— the  thought  comes  of  King  Canute  vainly  order- 
ing back  advancing  literal  waves  of  water ;  but  here 
a  corporation  ordered  back  sand  waves  and  was 
obeyed.  And  in  spite  of  being  a  city  built  upon  the 
sand,  the  city  has  already  grown  a  great  quantity 
of  trees  and  shrubs  and  grass  and  flowers.  Yet 
always  the  mind  comes  back  to  the  constant  menace 
of  sand ;  I  have  seen  men  of  Gary  shoveling  it  from 
their  walks  as  if  it  were  snow.  And  one  of  the 
oddest  of  sights  is  that  of  great  balls  of  wild 
tumbleweed  rolling,  wind-blown,  through  the  streets, 
from  the  unconquered  sand  regions  that  hem  the 
city  in. 

I  went  to  Gary  prepossessed  against  it.  I  was 
familiar  with  duke-owned  towns  of  England,  as  they 

301 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

were  before  the  World  War,  where  the  titled  men 
actually  owned  factories  and  stores  and  homes  and 
controlled  every  means  of  labor  and  life,  and  I  re- 
membered the  sad  hopelessness  of  aspect  of  the 
workingmen,  and  I  feared  to  find  something  of  the 
same  unhappiness  and  dolor  in  the  atmosphere  of 
this  corporation-owned  city  of  Gary.  But  I  found 
only  a  breezy  manliness,  an  atmosphere  of  satisfac- 
tion, of  positive  happiness ;  and  instead  of  the  black 
and  dismal  streets  that  I  had  known  in  Sheffield, 
the  most  important  of  the  cities  that  were  owned 
by  so-called  nobility,  I  found,  in  Gary,  clean  and 
wide  and  open  streets,  with  prosperous-looking  busi- 
ness buildings  and  alert  and  happy  people.  And 
it  is  not  a  negligible  item,  that  the  eating  is  of  a 
much  better  average,  judging  from  food  and  fruit 
shops,  and  from  restaurants,  than  in  smallish  Amer- 
ican cities  in  general:  and  this  is  probably  due  to 
corporation  influence,  from  seeing  business  ad- 
vantage in  a  properly  and  abundantly  fed  popu- 
lation. 

And  here  is  a  curious  fact  in  regard  to  Gary. 
City  of  stupendous  mills  though  it  is,  it  would  be 
quite  possible  for  a  visitor  to  go  there  and  barely 
know  that  mills  are  in  the  neighborhood.  For  there 
are  two  districts:  the  mill  district  and  the  district 
of  homes  and  schools  and  churches  and  stores;  the 
two  districts  are  not  far  enough  apart  to  make  for  in- 
convenience, but  are  far  enough  apart  to  permit  the 
home  section  to  be  happy-looking  and  clean  instead 
of  grimy  and  dirty.  If  smoke  clouds  now  and  then 

302 


THE  EXTRAORDINARY  MAKING  OF  GARY 

drift  over,  it  is  not  often  enough  to  make  much  of 
an  impression.  At  night  the  sky  is  often  lightened 
by  flames  from  the  flaming  mill  chimneys. 

Not  all  of  the  property  is  corporation-owned; 
much  of  it  is  owned  by  individuals,  the  founders 
having  deemed  the  combination  of  the  two  kinds  of 
proprietorship  to  be  best  for  the  place.  But  there 
are  highly  important  safeguards  as  to  kind  and  de- 
sign of  houses  to  be  built,  and  this  feature,  reserved 
for  rulership,  explains  the  consistently  excellent 
average  of  the  looks  of  the  buildings  of  the  city. 

There  are  gas  and  electricity,  water  and  sewers, 
fire  department,  police  and  newspapers;  and,  as  a 
citizen  proudly  expressed  it  to  me,  expatiating  on 
his  city's  advantages  and  advance,  "The  police 
make  over  five  thousand  arrests  a  year,  and  the  fines 
and  costs  amount  to  a  million  and  a  half  dollars!" 
— than  which  local  pride  could  not  well  say  more. 
A  few  of  the  policemen — of  course  I  should  here 
say  "police  officers" — are  women.  Some  of  its 
policemen  are  able  to  speak  ten  languages:  and  it 
is  also  said  that  the  policewomen  have  no  difficulty 
in  making  themselves  understood  in  one.  At  the 
same  time,  the  fact  that  the  various  nationalities 
of  the  city  number  fifty-two  makes  it  a  convenience 
to  be  a  linguist. 

The  alleys  of  Gary  are  an  interesting  feature, 
for  it  is  through  its  alleys  that  the  water-mains 
and  gas-mains  run,  so  that,  when  digging  up  is 
necessary,  as  it  seems  so  often  to  be  necessary  in 
every  city,  the  digging  is  done  in  these  alleys  in- 

303 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

stead  of  through  the  expensive  street  pavements,  so 
that  Gary  not  only  does  away  with  the  expensive- 
ness  of  ruining  such  pavements,  and  ruining  the 
sidewalks,  but  at  the  same  time  conducts  repairs 
and  makes  new  connections  with  a  minimum  of 
interference  with  traffic  and  business. 

Busy  though  the  place  is,  I  noticed  one  indication 
of  restful  peace:  an  advertisement  sonorously  and 
rhetorically  declaring  that :  "  After  the  vicissitudes 
of  life's  eventful  career,  one's  mind  resorts  to  a 
quiet  and  peaceful  final  resting  place";  *and,  after 
naming  the  place,  the  advertisement  concludes  with 
the  statement  that  it  is  "artistically  divided  into 
eight  thousand  family  lots." 

The  very  existence  of  Gary  is  the  most  remark- 
able fact  in  regard  to  it ;  but  the  city  has  also  won 
wide  fame  through  what  is  known  as  the  Gary  system 
for  schools. 

The  system  provides  for  practical  vocational  edu- 
cation in  addition  to  what  may  be  called  the  usual 
school  education.  It  represents  an  effort  to  run  the 
schools  on  a  business  basis. 

The  Gary  system  does  not  hold  down  the  am- 
bitious or  capable  child  to  a  dull  average  level,  but 
provides  for  the  natural  and  rational  advance  of  the 
more  capable  or  more  studious  children. 

The  schools  open  at  a  quarter  after  eight  and  con- 
tinue till  a  quarter  after  four;  attendance  for  five 
of  these  hours  being  required,  leaving  two  hours 
optional,  with  an  hour  at  mid-day  to  be  given  up  to 
luncheon  and  play.  There  are  also  Saturday 

304 


THE  EXTRAORDINARY  MAKING  OF  GARY 

schools,  for  the  catching  up  of  ambitious  but  back- 
ward children  and  for  such  as  have  fallen  behind 
through  sickness. 

The  pupils  are  not  tied  absolutely  to  one  room 
for  the  day,  but  shift  about  in  changing  from  teacher 
to  teacher;  the  teachers  having  each  a  specialty  or 
specialties  which  are  taught  to  different  classes  in 
turn.  It  is  a  pleasant  sight  to  see  the  children  pass- 
ing cheerfully  through  the  halls,  on  their  way  from 
room  to  room,  for  their  look  and  bearing,  the  com- 
posite look  and  bearing,  are  so  composed,  and  so 
indicative  of  a  quiet  happiness.  The  rooms  are 
so  arranged  that,  in  walking  through  the  halls,  the 
children  may  look  in  at  other  classes,  studying  or 
reciting.  It  is  all  open,  as  if  the  school  rooms  were 
a  set  of  open  workshops :  and  there  are  literal  work- 
shops, too,  where  chemistry,  for  example,  is  prac- 
tically applied,  where  the  children's  hands  are 
trained  in  various  practical  lines. 

The  frequent  changes  from  room  to  room  brighten 
the  day.  A  small  number  of  desks  is  noticed,  as 
tables  and  chairs  largely  meet  the  pupils'  needs. 
The  children  are  medically  examined  twice  in  every 
year.  The  buildings  are  admirable  in  exterior  de- 
signs, with  pleasant  interiors.  One  notices  unos- 
tentatious efforts  to  make  charming  surroundings. 
The  children  seem  to  develop  finely:  they  are  self- 
poised,  unaffected,  natural,  likable. 

It  seemed  interesting  that  even  such  a  thing  as 
chicken  raising  was  taught:  children  are  told,  for 
example,  how  to  set  a  hen  (what  a  mystery,  till  one 

305 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

learns !),  and  then  they  go  out  and  set  the  hen,  And 
they  are  taught  about  flowers  and  shrubs  and  plants, 
and  then  how  to  care  practically  for  them. 

Considering  the  practicalness  of  the  Gary  schools 
there  comes  the  thought  of  a  teacher,  a  Dickens  crea- 
tion, who  long  ago  had  hold  of  at  least  this  practical 
feature  of  teaching,  far  though  he  otherwise  was 
from  Gary  principles. 

"  'B-o-t,  bot,  t-i-n,  tin,  bottin,  n-e-y,  ney,  bottiney, 
noun  substantive,  a  knowledge  of  plants.  When  he 
has  learned  that  bottiney  means  a  knowledge  of 
plants,  he  goes  and  knows  'em.  That 's  our  system, 
Nickleby.'  " 


306 


CHAPTER  XXII 


THE   SOLITABY  DUNES 

ITH  enchanted 
forests  and  en- 
chanted glades,  with 
beauty  of  hills  and 
valleys  and  water, 
with  strange  and 
beautiful  birds  and 
plants,  with  all  the 
feeling  of  fairy- 
land, of  dreamland, 
the  solitary  dunes 
offer  themselves  to 
Chicago. 

Nor  is  their  charm  owing  to  their  being  near  one 
of  the  largest  of  the  world's  great  cities.  That, 
naturally,  adds  to  the  charm  through  unexpected- 
ness ;  but  the  charm  is  not  dependent  on  it.  Nor  is 
it  that  there  has  been  effort  to  give  more  credit, 
more  prominence,  to  the  sand  dunes  than  they  prop- 
erly deserve.  Chicago,  as  represented  by  those  who 
seek  for  beauty  in  nature,  loves  the  dunes  because 
they  are  lovable,  admires  their  beauty  because  it  is 
admirable,  and  visits  them  because  they  are  so 

307 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

readily  visitable.  The  accessibility  of  the  dunes  is 
in  itself  a  charm;  they  have  the  merit  of  accessible 
seclusion. 

The  dunes  are  never  thronged.  For  great  part  of 
the  year ;  that  is,  for  most  of  the  winter ;  they  are 
lonely.  At  other  times,  campers  are  there,  and 
transient  visitors  go  flittingly.  Even  when,  once 
in  a  while,  a  large  party  go  in  company,  or  when 
there  is  one  of  the  dune  pageants  that  are  a  yearly 
feature,  the  visitors  occupy  but  a  small  part  of  the 
dunes  for  a  few  hours. 

In  a  general  way  the  dunes  may  be  said  to  begin 
about  where  Gary  stands ;  but  that  immediate  region 
has  been  so  altered  by  city  streets  and  mills  as  to 
destroy  the  aspect  of  dunes,  even  though  there  still 
remains  the  permeative  impression  of  sand. 

So  it  is  now  a  little  east  of  Gary  that  the  dunes, 
the  solitary  dunes,  the  beautiful  dunes,  begin,  and 
they  extend,  unspoiled,  for  some  score  of  miles 
farther  eastward.  They  occupy  a  narrow  strip 
averaging  some  two  miles  in  width,  with  Lake 
Michigan  on  one  side,  and  on  the  other  side  railway 
tracks,  and  the  road  which  takes  the  place  of  the 
early  Indian  trail,  and  some  scattered  and  unfertile- 
looking  farms,  with  soil  part  sand  and  part  clay, 
for  the  sand  gradually  loses  its  power  as  it  strives  to 
reach  inland,  though  it  hungrily  and  reluctantly 
yields;  and  I  noticed  that  one  of  the  farmers  had 
bravely  set  out  an  orchard,  and  that  the  trees  had 
attained  to  several  years  of  growth,  but  I  also 
noticed  that  the  sand  in  the  orchard  had  unfor- 

308 


THE  SOLITARY  DUNES 

innately  become  broken  and  stirred,  and  that  half 
of  the  trees  were  already  smothered  and  the  other 
half  doomed. 

The  effectiveness  of  impression,  of  the  dunes,  is 
out  of  all  proportion  to  their  width.  Enter  the 
dune  region  at  any  point,  and  wander  as  fate  and 
fancy  lead,  and  in  a  few  minutes  you  are  hundreds 
of  miles  from  civilization,  in  an  unknown  kind  of 
land.  Men  have  become  confused  in  that  narrow 
strip,  and  have  wandered,  dazed,  bewildered,  lost, 
in  the  intricacies  of  these  strange  forests. 

It  is  a  region  of  scattered  and  successional  sand 
hills.  In  places  the  sand  has  been  blown  into  ridges 
and  heights  of  two  hundred  feet  in  altitude.  And 
it  is  curious  to  see,  as  one  may  often  see,  the  white 
sand  stirring  and  moving  and  blowing  in  clouds, 
even  from  the  tops  of  some  tall  hills,  threatening 
the  hills  themselves  with  destruction  and  promising 
to  form  other  hills.  And  I  have  seen,  far  up,  great 
trees  being  slowly  uncovered  at  their  roots,  and  the 
blown  sand  beginning  to  gather  about  the  trunks  of 
other  trees  and  mounting  against  their  trunks.  It  is 
a  shifting,  changing,  moving  region.  It  is  in  this 
sense  an  uncanny  region.  " Unstable  as  water"  is 
an  ancient  comparison;  but  nothing  could  easily  be 
more  unstable  than  sand. 

Single  trees  and  thickets  sparsely  cover  the  sand 
hills  and  sand  hollows,  the  trees  being  large  and 
small,  tall  and  short.  There  are  masses  of  cedars; 
there  are  pines,  deeply  and  darkly  green,  some  of 
them  being  three  and  a  half  or  four  feet  in  diameter, 

309 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

and  towering  to  heights  of  a  hundred  or  a  hundred 
and  fifty  feet;  there  are  oaks;  there  is  dogwood, 
flowering  finely  in  white;  there  are  grim  tamarack 
swamps  that  quake  beneath  you  as  you  walk.  There 
are  lakelets  and  pools,  some  of  them  of  wonderful 
blueness,  and  beside  these  lakelets  there  may  be 
little  thickets,  with  creeping  juniper  and  gnarled 
poplars  and  spruce  trees,  with  possible  elm  or  syca- 
more, and  with  clumps  of  antlered  sumac,  vivid  of 
hue.  There  are  masses  of  arbor-vitae.  There  are 
willows  in  manifold  variety.  There  are  ranks  of 
red  osiers.  Yet  always,  even  when  there  is  most 
of  beauty,  there  is  a  lurking  grimness,  a  sinister 
quality,  a  sense  as  of  ferocity,  of  threat,  of  some- 
thing terrible. 

Every  moment  something  is  changing.  It  fascin- 
ates. It  captivates.  It  binds  you  with  its  spell: 
the  spell  of  the  drifting  sand,  and  the  roaring  of 
great  winds,  the  vivid  contrast  of  the  whitest  of 
white  sand  and  the  bluest  of  blue  water,  the 
opalescent  distances,  the  heights  and  ridges  of  gray 
or  black  or  white — sometimes  a  white  which  becomes 
of  a  strange  and  gleaming  tawniness. 

An  electric  line  skirts  the  dunes,  running  from 
Gary  to  Michigan  City,  and  there  is  choice  of  several 
stations  at  which  one  may  get  off,  that  are  admirably 
situated  for  dune  exploration.  Mineral  Springs  is 
among  the  best  for  those  who  can  make  but  a  short 
visit  yet  who  wish  a  rich  and  full  impression.  Here 
you  leave  the  tiny  railway  station  and  walk  down  a 
lane  of  vivid  green,  deep-rutted  in  brown.  Several 

310 


LIBKARY 

OF  THE 

UNIVERSITY  OF  ILLINOIS 


THE- SOLITARY  DUNES 

fields  stretch  off  on  either  hand.  There  are  two  or 
three  little  farm  houses  in  sight.  There  is  a  field 
with  a  few  cattle.  There  is  a  field  across  which  two 
horses  go  gallantly  galloping.  Before  you,  as  you 
walk  on,  and  in  long  lines  to  right  and  to  left,  the 
dunes  rise  and  sweep.  And  soon  you  are  in  the 
secret  depths. 

You  wander,  perhaps  pretty  much  at  random,  and 
yet  following  a  direction  which  ought  to  lead  you  to 
the  lake ;  and  soon  you  know  that  you  are  approach- 
ing the  lake — Lake  Michigan,  I  mean,  not  the  little 
lakelets,  for  these  little  ones  you  come  to  and  pass. 
You  do  not  for  some  time  see  the  lake,  but  you  know 
that  you  are  nearing  it  because  you  hear  a  soft  boom- 
ing, a  gentle  roaring,  which  you  recognize  as  the 
sound  of  surf  beating  upon  a  shore ;  and  you  continue 
farther,  over  the  uneven  dunes,  and  now  you  are 
deep  among  the  trees  and  thickets,  and  now  you 
mount  a  higher  ridge — and  there  is  Lake  Michi- 
gan, spread  out  gloriously  before  you:  the  highest 
sand  hills  standing  in  an  uneven  line  close  to  the 
edge  of  the  lake. 

And  now,  the  summit  of  the  waterside  attained, 
the  soft  murmur  of  the  surf  becomes  a  violent  roar- 
ing, a  splendid  rush  of  water  against  the  shore,  and 
the  lake,  in  myriad  colors,  spreads  out  in  captivating 
miles ;  and  over  yonder  you  see  Chicago.  Why,  you 
have  been  feeling  as  if  you  were  hundreds  of  miles 
from  Chicago ! 

The  immense  loneliness — that  is  what  you  never 
get  away  from;  with  the  ceaseless  sound  of  the  beat- 

311 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

ing  surf,  and  the  sinister  mountains  of  sand,  and  the 
beautiful  and  terrible  impressiveness,  and  the  lights 
and  shadows  and  a  great  solemnity. 

You  turn,  and  plunge  again  into  the  depths  of 
duneland.  Here  is  the  trailing  arbutus,  the  tenderly 
beautiful  mayflower  of  the  Pilgrims,  wasting  its 
sweetness  on  the  desert  air;  here  are  orchids,  fringed 
with  yellow  or  white  or  red ;  here  are  masses  of  the 
glorious  trillium,  the  wake-robin;  here  is  cactus, 
flowering  in  profusion  and  hugging  close  the  ground 
in  ungainliness.  There  are  white  pond-lilies,  a  sheer 
delight,  and  there  are  pond  lilies  of  yellow;  there  are 
fringed  and  closed  and  open  gentians;  there  is  the 
blue  lobelia.  Here  the  cardinal-flower  thrusts  up  its 
flaming  torch ;  here  are  lupines  in  fields  of  immensity 
of  blue;  here  are  banks  of  bracken;  here,  in  lush 
quantity,  are  huckleberries. 

Here  and  there  is  a  camping  spot  or  a  tiny  hut, 
where  perhaps  some  artist  established  himself  for 
work  or  some  lover  of  beauty  and  of  nature  set  him- 
self down  to  enjoy  the  lonely  loveliness.  And  there 
are  still  spots  to  be  found  where  Indian  hunters 
camped,  where  still  it  is  possible  to  find  the  arrow- 
head of  flint,  or  the  spear-point;  and  where,  pre- 
served in  the  ashes  of  long-ago  camp-fires,  you  may 
be  so  fortunate  as  still  to  find  fish-hooks  and  needles 
of  bone. 

The  dunes  are  not  like  those  of  Provincetown,  on 
Cape  Cod,  where  the  walking  is  so  difficult  that  one 
plunges  with  every  step,  and  where  there  are  great 
bare  sweeps,  with  groves  of  ancient  dwarf  trees 

312 


THE  SOLITARY  DUNES 

nestled  in  sand  hollows ;  for  here,  on  the  Lake  Michi- 
gan dunes,  the  walking  is  fairly  easy,  and  there  are 
tall  trees.  (The  Provincetown  dunes  originally  had 
tall  trees  also,  when  the  Pilgrims  made  their  first 
landing  in  the  New  World  there,  before  sailing  on 
to  their  permanent  landing  at  Plymouth;  but  these 
Cape  Cod  dunes  long  ago  lost  their  trees  for  house- 
building or  for  firewood.) 

Great  masses  of  ice  are  blown  down  here,  at  the 
end  of  the  lake,  in  winter  time ;  and  when,  for  a  mov- 
ing-picture play,  some  scenes  in  Alaska  were  needed, 
with  a  ship  wrecked  in  the  ice,  and  Esquimaux  in 
costume,  these  Lake  Michigan  sand-dune  shores  gave 
the  necessary  setting. 

The  lake,  here,  gives  quantity  and  variety  of  fish 
to  tempt  the  fishermen.  There  are  lake  trout  and 
white  fish  and  herring;  there  are  great  sturgeon; 
and  there  are  salmon,  descendants  of  salmon  brought 
to  Chicago  for  the  fisheries'  exhibit  at  the  World's 
Fair  and  put  in  the  lake  at  the  close  of  the  big  show, 
whereat  the  salmon  made  their  habitat  down  here. 
But  there  has  come  a  curious  change :  at  the  World's 
Fair  they  were  red  salmon,  but  they  are  no  longer 
red,  for  the  fresh  water  has  changed  their  hue. 

White  gulls  go  soaring  in  beauty  above  the  beauti- 
ful white  sand.  Crows  go  blackly  flapping  by. 
There  are  the  fork-tailed  tern,  and  the  sentinel 
heron,  and  the  solemn  owl.  Great  birds  fly  out  of 
the  sedge  and  soaringly  flutter  away.  Far  overhead 
you  see  an  eagle  swinging  in  the  sky.  There  are 
hawks.  There  are  the  friendly  robins.  There  is 

313 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

the  red-headed  woodpecker  in  contrast  of  most  bril- 
liant red  and  most  brilliant  white. 

Xor  are  the  smaller  wild  animals  lacking,  for  still 
may  be  seen  the  weasel,  still  may  be  seen  the  musk- 
rat,  still,  bnt  more  rarely,  may  be  seen  the  fox. 

Always  the  billows  of  sand,  always  the  browns 
and  yellows  and  bines  and  blacks  and  greens :  always 
the  sense  of  allnrement:  for  mystery  and  charm 
are  there,  and  haunting  distances  are  there,  with 
fair  and  radiant  views. 

Yon  think  of  Tonchstone:  "In  respect  that  it  is 
solitary,  I  like  it  very  well";  for  always  a  chief 
characteristic  is  solitnde.  Except  on  the  rare  pa- 
geant days  or  when  the  Prairie  Clnb  has  organized 
an  exploring  walk,  you  may  go  for  miles  and  meet 
not  a  human  being.  And  one  day,  as  I  was  again 
thinking  of  this  haunting  solitude,  I  noticed  that  an 
old  man  was  hoveringly  accompanying  or  following 
me.  He  seemed  to  be  one  of  the  farmers  of  the 
fringe;  perhaps  he  owned  the  doomed  orchard;  I 
slowed,  and  he  came  up  with  me,  and  for  a  little  he 
was  silent:  then  he  said,  pointing  to  a  tree  with 
drooping  branches,  a  tree  all  knots  and  gnarls : 

"We  call  that  bitter  gum." 

He  said  it  almost  defiantly,  as  if  expecting  con- 
tradiction and  ready  to  meet  it.  But  I  merely  as- 
sented to  the  thus  oddly  volunteered  name,  and 
after  a  little  he  went  on : 

"There  isn't  any  place  in  this  region  where  that 
kind  of  tree  grows  except  here." 

Again  the  pause  of  almost  defiance,  again  a  mere 

314 


THE  SOLITAEY  DUNES 

assent,  again  a  continuance,  and  this  time  a  longer 
one,  with  a  hurried  rush  of  words  in  full  sweep : 

1 1  It  grows  in  Ohio  though.  And  it 's  tough  wood. 
ATI  ax  won't  touch  it.  And  one  day,  when  President 
Garfield  was  a  lad,  and  was  working  with  some  men 
in  the  woods,  they  set  him  to  work  on  a  bitter  gum, 
just  for  a  joke.  Well,  he  worked  for  hours,  but 
the  tree  didn't  seem  to  mind  it.  And  up  came  a 
thunder  storm,  with  a  big  rain,  and  he  stood  close 
against  the  trunk,  and  a  stroke  of  lightning  hit  a 
tree  close  by  and  smashed  it  into  smithereens,  and 
Garfield  he  was  knocked  down,  but  in  a  few  minutes 
he  came  to,  and  he  looked  at  that  smashed  tree  and 
then  at  his  own  bitter  gum,  and  he  said,  solemn  and 
slow,  '  Oh,  Lord !  Please  try  your  hand  on  this  tree 
next.'" 


315 


CHAPTER  XXIII 

WHY   CHICAGO   IS  ! 

VERYBODY  was 
awakened  in  old 
Philadelphia  one 
night  in  the  long 
ago,  and  every- 
body came  pour- 
out  into  the  streets 
in  the  darkness, 
weeping,  laughing, 
cheering,  almost 
frantic  with  joy, 
for  one  of  General 
Washington's  staff, 
Colonel  Tilghman,  had  come  galloping  in  with  the 
news  that  Cornwallis  was  taken  and  that  the  long 
war  was  over.  And  thoughts  came  flocking,  of  that 
night  of  passionate  joy,  when  I  read  a  brief  para- 
graph in  a  Chicago  paper  (this  was  a  year  or  two 
ago)  which  told  of  the  death  of  a  Chicago  merchant 
named  William  Tilghman,  a  descendant  of  Colonel 
Tilghman,  of  the  staff  of  General  George  Washing- 
ton. 

And  within  that  paragraph  lay  half  of  the  ex- 

316 


WHY  CHICAGO  IS! 

planation  of  how  and  why  the  greatness  of  Chicago 
has  come. 

For  it  is  not  enough  to  say  that  the  rise  and 
progress  of  Chicago,  a  rise  and  a  progress  quite  un- 
exampled, are  due  to  its  geographical  position,  or 
merely  to  say  that  the  remarkable  characteristics  of 
the  city  have  come  from  the  characteristics  of  its 
people.  As  to  the  natural  location — well,  I  have 
before  me  a  recently  published  declaration  that 
" Nature  was  prodigal  with  Chicago;  it  prepared  a 
place  for  a  perfect  city";  and  this  of  a  city  set 
originally  on  a  swamp,  below  the  level  of  the 
adjacent  lake !  Nor  is  it  enough  to  expatiate  on  the 
enterprising  character  of  the  inhabitants,  or  the 
tremendous  energy  which  has  made  the  city's 
motto,  " Chicago  first,  last  and  all  the  time!"  and 
which  has  justified  the  motto  with  mighty  deeds. 
Always,  one  feels  that,  as  an  explanation,  some- 
thing is  wanting,  something  is  missing,  something 
is  lost,  omitted,  needed.  Always,  one  feels  that 
there  has  been  no  getting  back  to  a  first  cause. 

On  the  day  on  which  I  read,  in  Chicago,  that  para- 
graph concerning  the  Chicago  descendant  of  a  dis- 
tinguished Southern  family  I  met  a  friend,  a 
Chicagoan,  who  is  a  lineal  descendant  of  the  John 
Eliot,  the  "Apostle  to  the  Indians,"  who  landed  at 
Boston  close  to  three  centuries  ago  and  made  great 
name  and  fame. 

And  the  conjunction  of  the  two  facts  suddenly 
fused  and  clarified  an  idea  that  for  some  time  had 
been  indistinctly  offering  itself  to  my  mind.  Now, 

317 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

all  at  once,  the  idea  became  clear.  And  it  was,  that 
the  explanation  of  Chicago's  greatness,  her  unique 
qualities,  her  amazing  rise  and  advance  as  a  city, 
came  from  an  unusual  and  balanced  combination  of 
the  best  blood  of  New  England  and  of  the  South. 

The  people  of  one  section  alone  could  not  have 
done  it.  But  the  extraordinary  union,  a  union  un- 
known in  such  degree  in  any  other  city,  of  people 
from  both  sections,  accomplished  the  unique  build- 
ing up  of  this  mighty  city,  met  and  overcame  all 
obstacles,  attained  to  marvelous  success,  wrought 
out  the  impossible.  St.  Louis  tried  with  men  and 
women  of  the  South.  Cleveland  with  men  and 
women  of  New  England.  Neither  city,  although 
making  'admirable  success,  could  make  a  success 
comparable  to  that  of  Chicago. 

It  was  the  best  blood  that  flowed  into  the  new  set- 
tlements. It  was  the  most  ambitious  people,  the 
most  daring,  the  most  courageous,  who  left  the 
known  regions  of  the  East  for  the  unknown  wilder- 
ness of  the  West;  it  was  the  strongest,  the  m/ost 
forceful,  the  best  educated,  and  those  most  imbued 
with  imagination;  it  was  those  who  could  look  into 
the  future  and  discern  somewhat  of  what  could  be 
wrought  in  the  future.  New  England  sent  west- 
ward the  pick  of  her  sons  and  daughters.  Virginia 
likewise  sent  westward  the  best  of  her  people. 
Many  from  New  England  first  settled  in  portions  of 
New  York  State  and  thence  made  their  farther  move 
onward  into  the  region  of  the  Great  Lakes  and  the 
Ohio  Eiver.  Many  Virginians,  with  some  from 

318 


WHY  CHICAGO  IS! 

Maryland,  settled  in  Kentucky,  and  thence  they  or 
their  descendants  crossed  the  Mississippi  to  St. 
Louis,  or  the  Ohio  Eiver  into  the  Illinois  country. 

In  Illinois,  Northerners  and  Southerners  met  and 
mingled ;  not  only  in  totals,  but  in  quality  and  time- 
liness. The  greatest  of  all  Americans  since  Wash- 
ington, Lincoln,  was  born  in  Kentucky  and  grew  up 
among  the  fortunately  amalgamated  folk  of  the 
Illinois  country.  And  his  political  rival,  the  "little 
giant, ' '  Douglas,  born  in  Vermont,  married  a  grand- 
niece  of  the  famous  Dolly  Madison  of  the  South. 

In  Illinois  the  two  races  met,  in  notable  quality 
and  numbers.  There  they  united.  They  fused. 
They  blended.  And  the  result  was  Chicago. 

The  result  was  Chicago  because  to  Chicago 
naturally  went  the  leadership  of  the  Illinois  country, 
for  it  was  at  the  spot,  in  that  country,  that  was  best 
fitted  for  leadership.  The  acquisition,  from  the 
South,  of  the  gallant  spirit  of  the  Cavaliers,  the 
acquisition  from  the  North  of  the  unswervable 
bravery  of  the  Pilgrims,  developed  a  remarkable 
blend. 

At  the  entrance  of  the  Art  Institute  of  Chicago 
is  a  statue  of  George  Washington:  just  within  the 
entrance  is  a  statue  that  symbolizes  the  Pilgrim: 
and  the  juxtaposition  of  these  two  statues  illus- 
trates, unintentionally  but  strikingly,  the  principal 
reason  for  Chicago's  development. 

In  Chicago,  almost  everything  has  been  done 
within  the  memory  of  men  or  women  now  living. 
It  is  centuries  condensed  into  a  lifetime.  Before 

319 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

me  is  a  newspaper  paragraph,  telling  of  a  birthday 
celebration  of  a  woman  who  was  born  in  Chicago  in 
1829:  eight  years  before  the  place  became  a  city! 
And  her  children  and  her  grandchildren  and  her 
great-grandchildren  were  swarmingly  present. 

Why,  she  was  a  girl,  approaching  the  age  of  ten, 
when  Harriet  Martinean  (how  large  that  name 
loomed  in  the  long  ago)  visited  Chicago  and  wrote: 
1  'It  is  a  remarkable  thing  to  meet  snch  an  assemblage 
of  educated,  refined  and  wealthy  persons  as  may  be 
found  there,  living  in  small,  inconvenient  houses 
on  the  edge  of  a  wild  prairie ";  and  also,  "I  never 
saw  a  busier  place  than  Chicago  was  at  the  time  of 
our  arrival." 

Such  were  even  from  the  beginning  the  influences 
of  the  blending  of  Xorth  and  South ;  a  natural  blend- 
ing, which  kept  on  for  years. 

And  the  Chicago  patriarch  of  1829  was  a  young 
woman  when  clear-eyed  Fredrika  Bremer,  the 
Swedish  novelist,  visited  Chicago,  by  this  time  ad- 
vanced to  the  dignity  of  a  twenty-five  thousand  pop- 
ulation, and  wrote  that  she  found  there  "the  most 
agreeable  and  delightful  people  she  had  ever  met 
anywhere. ' ' 

The  people  of  Chicago,  to  use  the  ancient  phrase 
of  Joel,  dream  dreams  and  see  visions;  they  have 
from  the  first  dreamed  dreams  and  seen  visions; 
and  they  have  made  their  dreams  realities,  and  their 
visions  become  true.  It  is  a  city  of  deep-rooted 
idealism. 

Chicago  talks  in  superlatives,  as:  "Chicago  and 

320 


WHY  CHICAGO  IS! 

its  surrounding  territory  constitute  the  most 
prosperous  section  in  the  United  States  and  there- 
fore in  the  world. "  The  faith  of  Chicagoans  in 
their  city  is  absolutely  unquestioning.  On  a  rail- 
way train,  a  Chicagoan,  in  animated  conversation 
with  a  stranger  from,  the  East,  talked  glowingly 
of  his  city.  "Good-by,"  said  the  stranger,  in 
parting ;  "I  am  glad  to  have  met  the  president  of  the 
Ananias  Club."  And  the  Chicagoan 's  feelings  were 
deeply  hurt,  for  he  had  not  thought  of  exaggerating: 
and  the  Easterner  was  ignorant  of  Chicago. 

Turning  the  leaves  of  a  description  of  Chicago 
written  in  1873  I  noticed  that  Chicago  then 
possessed  "the  finest  streets  and  the  most  magnifi- 
cent buildings  in  the  world."  One  smiles;  and  then 
comes  the  thought  of  the  advantage  of  hitching  one 's 
wagon  to  a  star. 

"Not  boasters,  but  boosters,"  say  Chicagoans  of 
themselves;  and  anyhow,  as  Henry  James  long  ago 
remarked,  although  there  are  boasters  who  annoy, 
there  are  other  boasters  whom  one  loves  for  their 
very  boasting. 

Chicagoans  say  of  themselves  that  they  have  the 
"I  will"  spirit.  And  if  the  city  is  really  the  biggest 
and  best  and  finest  and  strongest  and  most  amazing 
they  think  that  they  ought  to  say  so. 

The  city  very  seriously  wants  everything  in  sight. 
When  a  Chicagoan  looks  out  over  Lake  Michigan 
and,  considering*  it  a  detriment,  wishes  that  the 
space  it  occupies  could  be  made  into  extensions  of 
the  city,  except  for  a  canal  for  necessary  shipping, 

321 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

he  is  really  very  much  in  earnest;  just  as  Walter 
Scott's  Baillie  Nicol  Jarvie  was  in  earnest  in 
wishing  that  exquisite  Loch  Lomond  could  be  filled 
in,  except  for  a  narrow  canal  down  the  middle. 

The  versifier  is  unknown  to  fame  who  wrote: 
"The  men  who  travel  from  coast  to  coast  declare 
they  love  Chicago  most,"  but  he  expressed  an  idea 
with  which  every  Chieagoan  coincides. 

A  Chicago  poet  of  years  ago,  named  Taylor,  with 
the  two  excellent  given  names  of  Benjamin  Franklin, 
loved  to  write  of  his  city  with  solemnity  of  belief. 
Of  the  food  shipped  out  from  Chicago  he  wrote : 

"  'Give  us  this  day  our  daily  bread,'  the  planet's  Christian 

prayer ; 
Chicago,  with  her  open  palm,  makes  answer  everywhere." 

And  of  the  city's  charter  he  declared: 

"The  Lord's  recording  Angel  holds  the  charter  in  his 

hand — 
He  seals  it  on  the  sea,  and  he  signs  it  on  the  land!" 

It  is  not  in  the  least  a  joke  that  Chicago  wishes 
to  fetch  the  capital  of  the  United  States  to  some 
near-by  spot  on  the  shore  of  Lake  Michigan.  After 
all,  the  city  of  Washington  is  not  in  the  heart  of  the 
country,  is  not  in  the  center  of  national  population ! 

Chicago  is  where  the  influence  of  New  York  and 
the  East  ceases;  that  is,  the  influence  of  the  East 
as  marking  any  sense  of  inferiority  in  the  Middle 
West.  Until  Chicago  is  reached,  city  after  city 
yields  homage  to  New  York,  and  shrinks  with  shame 

322 


OXFORD-LIKE  CHARM 


LIBRARY 

OF  THE 

UNIVERSITY  OF  ILLINOIS 


WHY  CHICAGO  IS! 

when  given  the  description  of  Middle  West.  But 
Chicago  is  proud  of  being  in  the  Middle  West !  Is  it 
not  the  natural  situation  for  a  city  that  dominates ! 

And  from  this  central  location  have  recently  come 
new  advantages  through  the  unexpected  annexation 
of  some  important  printing  establishments  from 
New  York,  with  more  quite  possible  to  come,  and 
with  the  new  zone  system  of  the  United  States  post- 
office  department  a  promisingly  strong  factor. 

The  Chicago  blend  made  and  still  makes  for  an 
alert  and  American  city.  You  see  a  gathering  of 
Chicago  business  men;  they  are  men  among  whom 
pomposity  finds  no  worshiper ;  they  are  young,  com- 
pared with  those  of  similar  gatherings  in  older 
cities;  and  the  memory  comes  of  the  description, 
by  Bernard  Shaw,  of  some  English  officer  who 
could  heliograph  his  orders  to  distant  camps  by 
merely  nodding,  for  here  is  a  roomful  of  helio- 
graph heads.  (But,  after  all,  you  do  not  catch  a 
Chicagoan  nodding!) 

An  American  city,  this ;  a  city  which  stands  for  a 
lightening  and  brightening  of  the  somber  clouds  that 
hang  on  the  national  horizon :  a  city  which  stands  for 
noble  advancement  in  noble  things,  for  art  and 
beauty,  for  human  feeling,  for  family  affection  and 
homes,  for  the  love  of  children. 

Chicago  is,  because  she  has  been ;  she  will  be,  be- 
cause she  is ;  and  the  love  of  children  will  keep  her 
traditions  alive.  Her  many  schools,  her  magnificent 
public  playgrounds,  with  their  swimming  pools  and 
music  and  gymnastics,  her  bathing  beaches,  with 

323 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

especial  regard  for  the  needs  of  children,  her 
libraries  and  books,  with  special  attention  to  the 
advantages  for  children,  her  great  parks,  without, 
so  she  proudly  claims,  a  single  keep-off-the-grass 
sign — such  things  all  tell  of  a  broad  and  wise 
humanity.  And  here,  in  a  newspaper,  coming  op- 
portunely as  if  to  point  these  ideas  with  a  concrete 
example,  is  a  photograph  of  children  and  a  para- 
graph of  description:  the  picture  being  of  a  large 
group  of  happy  children,  photographed  because 
some  one  had  discovered  that  there,  in  a  single  block 
on  Lincoln  Street  (name  of  good  omen,  that!)  there 
were  sixty-five  youngsters,  "from  bottle-size  to 
high-school  age,"  and  that  "every  family  in  the 
block  boasts  of  being  American-born  on  both  sides" ! 
It  was  no  mere  chance  that  made  a  child-poem  the 
classic  of  Chicago.  The  mind  and  heart  of  the 
author,  Eugene  Field,  had  been  developed  in  this 
city  of  feeling,  and  Chicago  will  never  forget  his 
"Little  Boy  Blue": 

"The  little  toy  dog  is  covered  with  dust, 

But  sturdy  and  staunch  he  stands ; 

And  the  little  toy  soldier  is  red  with  rust, 

And  his  musket  molds  in  his  hands. 

Time  was  when  the  little  toy  dog  was  new, 

And  the  soldier  was  passing  fair; 

And  that  was  the  time  when  our  Little  Boy  Blue 

Kissed  them  and  put  them  there. 

"  'Now,  don't  you  go  till  I  come/  he  said, 
'And  don't  you  make  any  noise !' 
So,  toddling  off  to  his  trundle-bed, 

324 


WHY  CHICAGO  IS! 

He  dreamt  of  the  pretty  toys ; 

And,  as  he  was  dreaming,  an  angel  song 

Awakened  our  Little  Boy  Blue — 

Oh,  the  years  are  many,  the  years  are  long, 

But  the  little  toy  friends  are  true. 

'  'Ay,  faithful  to  Little  Boy  Blue  they  stand, 

Each  in  the  same  old  place, 

Awaiting  the  touch  of  a  little  hand, 

The  smile  of  a  little  face; 

And  they  wonder,  as  waiting  the  long  years  through 

In  the  dust  of  that  little  chair, 

What  has  become  of  our  Little  Boy  Blue, 

Since  he  kissed  them  and  put  them  there." 


325 


CHAPTER  XXIV 


THE   GOLD    COAST 

IVING  to  an  incredible  age, 
there  died,  at  length,  in 
Chicago,  the  last  survivor  of 

Jone    of    the    most    im- 
portant   gatherings    in 
the  history  of  America ; 
the  Boston  Tea  Party! 

David  Kennison  was  the 
man  who  lived  the  longest  of 
the  ninety  men  who,  dis- 
guised as  Indians,  boarded 
the  tea  ships  in  Boston  harbor  and  threw  three  hun- 
dred and  forty-two  chests  of  tea  into  the  water. 
When  he  died,  in  1852,  he  had  reached  the  age,  so 
it  is  recorded,  of  one  hundred  and  fifteen  years, 
three  months  and  seventeen  days.  Chicago  seems 
to  have  accepted  him  and  his  claims  without  ques- 
tion; and  indeed  I  do  not  know  that  there  was  ever 
any  ground  for  question.  The  city  did  not,  how- 
ever, pay  much  attention  to  him  while  he  was  alive ; 
for,  after  all,  he  represented  Boston  history  and 
not  that  of  Chicago.  And  his  name  is  not  to  be 
found  in  Boston  books  of  history,  for  Boston  never 
knew,  as  a  matter  of  record  or  even  as  general 

326 


THE  GOLD  COAST 

knowledge,  the  identity  of  the  ninety  patriotic  law- 
breakers; nor,  so  it  has  always  been  supposed,  did 
any  of  the  Boston  leaders  of  agitation,  such  as  John 
Hancock,  Samuel  Adams,  John  Adams,  take  any  part 
in  the  tea  episode;  they  preferring  to  leave  actual 
dangerous  participation  to  men  of  what  were  deemed 
the  humbler  classes;  so  it  naturally  happened  that 
although  the  deed  itself  was  looked  upon  as  of  im- 
mense consequence,  as  it  really  was,  the  actors  in 
it  were  little  thought  about.  But  they  ought  to  have 
been  thought  about;  and  David  Kennison,  of 
Chicago — how  incredible  it  appears! — was  the  last. 

In  the  rooms  of  the  Chicago  Historical  Society  is 
a  vial  containing  tea,  and  with  it  is  a  formal  state- 
ment, in  which  David  Kennison  declares,  "upon  his 
sacred  honor,"  that  the  vial  contains  some  tea  saved 
from  what  was  thrown  into  Boston  harbor  in  1773. 
The  statement  was  written  in  1848,  with  five 
Chicagoans  of  standing  witnessing  it,  upon  his  112th 
birthday;  the  last  witnessing  name,  one  notices, 
being  that  of  Henry  Fuller,  father  of  the  author 
of  "The  Cliff  Dwellers." 

Kennison  died  poor;  Chicago  not  having  prac- 
tically realized  that  it  possessed  an  absolutely 
unique  pre-Revolutionary  relic,  a  human  one. 
When  he  died  his  body  was  put  casually  away,  mis- 
laid as  it  were;  at  least,  the  place  of  burial  is  un- 
known :  but  at  the  right  of  the  Wisconsin  Street  en- 
trance to  Lincoln  Park,  and  shaded  by  cottonwoods, 
is  a  largish  red  bowlder,  marked  with  a  bronze 
tablet.  For,  a  good  many  years  after  his  death, 

327 


the  Sons  of  the  Eevolution  and  the  Sons  of  the 
American  Revolution  (as  if  it  were  a  different  Eevo- 
lution!) and  the  Daughters  of  the  American  Eevolu- 
tion, united  to  do  him  honor,  the  inscription  on  the 
tablet  stating  that  he  was  buried  as  near  the  spot 
where  the  bowlder  stands  as  can  be  known. 

Lincoln  Park  stretches  for  miles  along  Lake 
Michigan,  and  is  bordered  by  thousands  of  homes, 
which  face  out  upon  the  lake,  or  are  built  upon  the 
streets  that  lead  away  from  it;  and  in  that  region 
there  is  so  much  of  wealth,  so  much  of  the  kind  of 
beauty  of  living  that  comes  only  from  the  lavish  ex- 
penditure of  wealth,  that  the  name  of  the  Gold 
Coast  has  been  aptly  given  to  it.  And  so  happy 
and  charming  a  region  is  it  that  one  feels  that  there, 
if  anywhere,  "they  fleet  the  time  carelessly,  as  they 
did  in  the  golden  world. ' y 

The  park  itself  is  a  noble  park,  and  this  home 
region,  so  close  against  it  and  close  to  it,  is  a  region 
of  fine  and  costly  buildings,  finely  set. 

There  are  beautiful  doors  and  charming  stone 
balconies,  there  are  many  a  house  and  garage 
planned  together  as  an  architectural  whole,  there 
are  admirable  windows,  there  are  quoins  and 
balustrades,  there  are  pillars,  there  are  stone-topped 
high  brick  walls,  there  are  Italian  gardens,  there 
are  marble  terraces,  there  is  many  a  home  built 
with  a  second-floor  drawing-room  so  that,  English 
fashion,  the  people  "go  down  to  dinner."  There 
are  houses  that  are  masterpieces  in  stone.  And  all 
the  houses  are  modern,  and  with  almost  all  there  is 

328 


THE  GOLD  COAST 

evident  a  fine  sense  of  restraint.  The  Chicago 
town-houses  of  to-day  offer  to  the  world  models 
of  good  taste ;  they  have  nothing  of  the  exuberant  or 
exotic. 

Costly  though  these  homes  are,  and  large  and  im- 
posing as  some  of  them  are,  and  permeative  as  is 
the  sense  of  beauty,  it  is  a  curious  fact  that  not  one 
is  the  equal  of  the  three  best  in  New  York:  but, 
after  all,  those  three  best  New  York  houses  were 
built  by  three  Pittsburghers,  Carnegie,  Schwab  and 
Frick. 

Among  the  streets  of  very  finest  effectiveness  is 
Astor  Street,  between  North  Avenue  Boulevard  and 
Schiller  Street ;  and,  although  its  houses  are  not  the 
costliest  of  the  Gold  Coast,  they  are  fine  without 
ostentation  and  there  is  an  atmosphere  of  home- 
likeness.  The  street  is  elm  shaded,  the  houses  are 
mostly  of  brick  with  stone  trimming,  they  are  of 
three  or  four  stories  in  height  and  set  near  together 
but  not  shoulder  to  shoulder,  and  each  has  its  sunny 
bit  of  greenery.  It  is  a  street  of  charm  and  dis- 
tinction. And  there  remains,  in  particular,  the 
memory  of  a  house  with  pillared  colonnade,  looking 
into  a  garden  hidden  from  the  street  by  a  wall  of 
brick.  Here  there  is  the  perfection  of  present-day 
architecture,  distinctly  and  distinctively  American, 
apparently  inspired  by  the  brick  mansions  of 
Annapolis  and  Williamsburgh. 

Some  of  the  houses  of  the  Lincoln  Park  region 
are  inspired  by  the  English  Georgian,  some  show 
the  inspiration  of  the  Italian  Renaissance,  some 

329 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

have  a  French  atmosphere  about  them.  I  particu- 
larly remember  one  delightful  building  facing  the 
lake,  a  building  Palladian-fronted,  with  fluted 
pilasters.  And  there  is  even  a  Venetian  palazzo, 
also  facing  the  water,  carefully  reproduced.  Where 
Bellevue  Place  joins  Lincoln  Park  there  is  an  ad- 
mirable house  of  French  design  of  smooth  gray 
stone.  And  not  far  from  this  is  that  forty-year 
ago  idea  of  a  French  house,  the  Potter  Palmer  home, 
which  was  provocative  of  so  much  of  jest  and  raillery 
— and  of  so  much  extravagant  praise ! — and  to  which 
some  of  the  lines  of  James  Russell  Lowell  seem 
cheerfully  applicable. 

"All  up  and  down  and  here  and  there, 

"With  Lord-knows-whats  of  round  and  square 

Stuck  on  at  random  anywhere, — 

It  was  a  house  to  make  one  stare, 

All  corners  and  all  gables ; 

And  all  the  oddities  to  spare 

Were  set  upon  the  stables." 

But  Chicago  long  ago  admirably  passed  the  stage 
of  towered  and  turreted  uneasiness.  And  the 
Potter  Palmers  could  bear  with  architectural 
criticism  with  much  of  equanimity,  not  only  because 
of  the  co-existent  praise,  but  because  they  them- 
selves were  people  of  acknowledged  leadership  of 
many  years'  standing.  A  letter  written  from 
Chicago  in  1888  by  Susan  Hale,  sister  of  Edward 
Everett  Hale,  told  of  a  luncheon  given  in  her  honor 
at  which  she  sat  between  the  hostess  and  Mrs. 

330 


THE  GOLD  COAST 

Potter  Palmer,  "a  north-side  magnate  of  great  im- 
portance, a  very  pretty  little  woman,  married  to  an 
ancient  millionaire." 

This  north-side  region  near  the  lake  has  more 
wrought-iron  entrance  gates  than  has  all  of  ancient 
Nuremburg.  It  seems  to  love  wrought-iron  gates! 
Some  are  fantasies  of  black  iron  garlands  and 
tendrils.  Some  are  twenty  feet  in  height  with 
fences  of  twelve  feet,  set  in  great  bases  of  block 
stone.  But  these  gates  and  fences  have  been  given 
extravagance  of  size  for  the  small  areas  that  they 
shut  in,  which  are  often  only  a  driveway  or  a  small 
ordered  garden,  and  would  more  fittingly  front  great 
estates. 

The  park  stretches  for  miles  to  the  northward, 
well  on  toward  the  limits  of  the  city ;  but  the  region 
to  which  the  name  of  Gold  Coast  is  applied  does 
not  anywhere  extend  for  more  than  a  little  inland. 
And,  although  there  are  mainly  residences,  there  are 
also  numerous  apartment  houses  that  have  recently 
been  built,  a  few  of  them  being  large  and  tall  build- 
ings, but  the  general  type  being  not  high,  of  four 
stories,  or  three  stories  and  a  basement,  with  deeply 
recessed  center  and  projecting  wings,  and  with  the 
space  between  the  wings  charmingly  cared  for  with 
grass  and  walks  and  shrubbery.  Some  of  these 
apartment  houses  are  beautiful,  many  are  extremely 
costly,  almost  all  are  at  least  of  high  excellence. 
11  People  want  a  stylish  home,  with  elevator  boys 
in  uniform,  that  court  between  the  wings,  and  the 
little  fountain,  and  the  grand  entrance — all  just 

331 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

right,"  as  it  is  expressed  in  "The  Common  Lot." 
In  this  part  of  the  city  also  have  developed 
kitchenette  apartments,  where  gas-stoves  and  dishes 
and  knives  and  so  on  are  supplied,  and  where  ice 
and  garbage  are  cared  for  from  the  outside,  and 
where  there  is  a  vast  deal  of  comfort  with  minimum 
of  space,  and  where  the  bed  is  a  thing  of  household 
magic,  a  sort  of  glorified  "folding  bed,"  a  part  of 
the  building,  a  thing  of  science,  with  French  doors 
and  mirrors  and  a  big  bed  of  metal  which  swings 
on  a  pivot  and  works  with  an  oscillating  lever  and 
comes  only  when  wanted.  This  contrivance  is  so 
clever  that  it  takes  up  the  bed  and  walks. 

But  the  prevailing  buildings  of  the  immediate 
neighborhood  facing  the  parkway  and  the  lake  on  the 
north  side  are  the  family  residences,  built  with  an 
air  of  uncramped  spaciousness  both  as  to  outward 
setting  and  interiors. 

Now  and  then,  too,  there  is  uniqueness  of  plan,  as 
with  the  homes  of  three  wealthy  families,  inter-re- 
lated, who  live  in  houses  that  are  built  together  as 
a  group,  and  an  extremely  distinguished  group; 
each  house  being  complete  in  itself,  but  the  three 
households  uniting  in  garage  and  heating  plant  and 
servants'  quarters. 

' '  Queen  of  the  West !  by  some  enchanter  taught 
To  lift  the  glory  of  Aladdin's  Court"— 

so  wrote  Bret  Harte  of  Chicago,  and  one  thinks  of 
such  lines  when  passing  along  the  golden  beauty 
of  Lincoln  Park  and  its  adjoining  homes.  And  one 

332 


THE  GOLD  COAST 

also  thinks,  here,  of  the  lines  of  John  Boyle 
0  'Keilly  on  Chicago : 

' '  Proud  like  a  beautiful  maiden, 
Art-like  from  forehead  to  feet"; 

for  all  is  so  restful,  so  perfect.  Here  one  thinks  of 
Chicago  as  a  city  exceedingly  fair ;  and  assuredly  it 
is  also  a  city  of  saroir  faire. 

The  park,  with  its  long  sweeping  north  and  south 
dr-ives,  is  the  great  avenue  of  approach  by  motor 
from  all  the  suburbs  along  the  north  shore  and  from 
all  the  northside  dwelling  contingent  who  motor  in 
to  the  Loop  for  business  and  pleasure.  The  proces- 
sion sweeps  southward  in  the  morning,  then  north- 
ward at  the  end  of  the  day;  the  long  restful  park 
ride,  in  sight  of  the  lake,  with  its  zestful  breezes, 
being  an  anticipated  and  appreciated  part  of  the 
day's  life.  Now  that  the  fine  new  bridge  is  opened 
the  approach  is  directly  into  Michigan  Avenue  and 
the  Lake  Front  Mile.  Heretofore  there  has  been  the 
twisting  and  turning  aside  to  approach  the  vortex 
of  the  old  Eush  Street  Bridge.  And  the  new  bridge 
will  also  add  immensely  to  the  number  of  those  who 
will  motor  through  the  park  for  the  sake  of  the  park 
itself. 

Along  the  Gold  Coast  you  are  impressed  by  the 
noiselessness.  For  it  is  mile  after  mile  without  rail- 
way, without  trolley  cars :  nothing  but  automobiles 
and  horses  and  double-decked  motor-buses — the 
horses  being  not  for  carriages  but  for  a  vast  amount 
of  horseback  riding:  long  Lincoln  Park  has  been  a 

333 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

paradise  for  those  fast-vanishing  and  noble  animals, 
the  dog  and  the  horse.  And  the  park  walks  are  still 
haunted  by  the  also  vanishing  human  pedestrian ! 

The  long,  thoroughfaring  drives,  the  many  paths 
for  saddle  horses,  the  footpaths,  the  little  lakes  and 
lagoons,  the  stretches  of  vivid  green  grass  between 
lagoons  and  lake,  the  breakers  rolling  in,  perhaps 
out  of  a  mist  or  perhaps  from  sweeps  that  go  shim- 
mering gloriously  into  the  far  distances,  all  are 
beautiful.  All  the  toil  of  the  city  seems  far  away. 

On  summer  days  and  summer  evenings  what 
throngs,  what  gayety,  with  music  and  boating  and 
pretty  clothes,  and  a  great  beach  where  thousands 
gather  at  a  time !  Not  from  the  Gold  Coast  houses, 
these,  but  from  the  massed  homes  that  are  near  it 
throughout  all  its  length.  The  great  long  park  is 
used.  The  grass  is  walked  over  and  sat  upon. 
Families  bring  their  lunch-baskets  and  stay  all 
Sunday.  Many  living  not  too  far  away  walk  to 
the  bathing  beach  in  bathing  suits  with  flapping 
bath  robes.  All  these,  too,  "fleet  the  time  carelessly 
as  they  did  in  the  golden  world. ' ' 

An  odd  custom,  in  Lincoln  Park — it  happens  often 
enough  to  call  it  a  custom — is  for  private  motor-cars 
to  stop  and  take  up,  or  offer  to  take  up,  strangers 
who  are  waiting  for  a  'bus.  A  man  will  stop  and 
offer  a  seat  to  a  maid  or  matron,  and  it  is  for  her 
to  decide  whether  or  not  she  will  accept;  in  either 
case  there  is  no  ill  will  on  either  side;  and  usually 
the  offering  is  from  a  man  to  another  man  or  men. 
One  day,  standing  waiting  for  the  'bus,  a  heavy 

334 


THE  GOLD  COAST 

shower  came  on.  There  were  two  well-dressed 
young  women  near  me.  There  was  also  a  neat 
colored  woman,  holding  a  baby  in  her  arms.  A 
closed  car,  driven  by  a  prettily  gowned  girl  drew  up 
in  front  of  us.  The  girl  had  eyes  for  only  the 
colored  woman,  who  was  quite  evidently  a  stranger 
to  her.  She  asked  her  to  get  in,  and  the  mother  and 
child  were  thus  pleasantly  saved  from  a  wetting. 

The  park  extends  northward  to  St.  Loyola's  big- 
domed  pile,  and  for  a  long  distance,  toward  the  end 
of  the  drive,  houses  are  near  the  very  edge  of  the 
lake,  with  the  waves  rolling  in  to  the  garden  walls. 

Some  of  the  churches  of  the  Coast  region  are  of 
special  interest.  Far  down  at  the  southward  end, 
on  Lincoln  Parkway  at  Delaware  Place,  is  the 
Fourth  Presbyterian,  a  church  of  what  may  be  called 
a  sort  of  dainty  Gothic;  a  building  of  light  gray 
stone,  excellent  in  suggestions,  but  with  an  unfor- 
tunately inadequate  little  spire.  More  interesting 
than  the  church  itself  is  the  delightful  open  cloister 
adjoining,  with  little  stone  saints  circled  around  the 
top  of  the  shaft  of  the  fountain.  The  church,  the 
arcaded  cloister,  and  the  mullion-windowed  parish 
house  make  a  quiet,  ecclesiastic  group,  very  peaceful 
and  churchly  in  appearance,  the  architect  being 
Cram  of  Boston,  a  notable  church-builder  of  our 
time. 

A  church  of  dignity  and  quiet  impressiveness  is 
that  of  the  Christian  Scientists'  on  Wrightwood 
Avenue,  just  off  the  park;  a  church  that  is 
thoroughly  classic,  with  its  fronting  pillars  of  stone, 

335 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 


v  :  ;•     :".   i- 
l_zir       : 
:    r   7.1: 

:.:i  :_:::_. 


-  -    :  :    r  ~L    - 
:        i  r^zjxs.  a  cfcmrdi  that  rises  m 


.  - 
r  -. 


-i          :: 


K> 

-- 


THE  GOLD  COAST 


in  them  is  eutiidj  due  to  his 
ability,  and  whatever  there  is  without 
laid  at  my  door." 

There  are  many  statues  in  the  park. 
Shakespeare,  with  the  slender  skimpy  legs  of 
sculptured  and  pictured  tradition  uufrnsufd,  and  he 
is  mercifully  given  a  seat.  There  is  a  rafter  dapper 
Benjamin  Fnmkfiu.  There  is  m  General  Grant,  a 
larjje  eojnestnan  oy  one  -KoiMsso.  stt  upou  a  ff 
perforated  base.  To  Saint  Gaudens  this 


and  briefly  a  bad  monmnent.    And  it  is.    But  it  is 
at  least  a  large  "•*  !»«••••»•§  »••••••••  »i  to  a  man 

_.*  1__  _ J    •  * _:»  _•  _•»_ m 

ox  larEe  ff**"  impressive  career  r  and  a^-  c  « 
eJeetrie  light  thrown  np  from  the  fonr  coners, 
putting  it  into  bright  reoe£ 

ing  «|^ilnmu^  ft  is 

There  are 

them  is  a  Goethe,  which  art  lovers  hope  to 
Xot  in  the  least  hfiriHSf  he  wns  m  fli  !•!••,  for  the 
hope  arose  before  the  lipgMiiig  of  the  Great  War 
and  is  based  on  united  grounds  of  thrift  and  art. 

The  artists'  objection  is  that  it  is  an  agly  etatne, 
HHiMBBitniy  ill »it  modern,  i^entjeman  and.  poet 


"half-dad  aspect  of  a  heathen  Fin,  but  without 
pants"  as  a  f^*ffagft  wit  expressed  it:  or,  as  a  little 
saViiJiiil  said,  with  no  thought  of  humor,  "I  did 
not  know,  mother,  that  Goethe  was  a  Greek." 

THie  argument  of  thrift  is  merely  to  put  good 
bronze  to  good  use  by  mrttiug  it  up  and  using  it  for 
something  else;  as,  some  years  ago,  an  unfortunate 
of  Columbus,  here  in  Chicago,  went  into  the 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

melting  pot  (no  metaphorical  " melting  pot*'  for 
that  pioneer  Italian!)  and  reappeared  as  a  dignified 
McKinley.  * '  Thrift,  thrift,  Horatio ! ' ' 


338 


CHAPTER  XXV 


A   CHILD   AND   ITS   A-B-C 

[HAT  the  best  of  all  the 
monuments  to  Lincoln 
should  be  in  Chicago,  and 
that  the  finest  lines  de- 
scriptive of  the  monument 
were  written  by  a  Chicago  poet 
— but  that  the  lines  were  not 
written  about  the  Lincoln 
monument  at  all — are  among 
the  Chicago  anomalies.  Wil- 
liam Vaughn  Moody  wrote  of 
the  Colonel  Shaw  monument  in  Boston,  instead  of 
the  monument  in  Chicago,  to  Lincoln,  who  inspired 
Shaw;  Saint  Gaudens  made  both  monuments;  and 
the  noble  opening  lines  remain  ineffaceably  in  the 
memory : 

"Before  the  solemn  bronze  Saint  Gaudens  made 
To  thrill  the  heedless  passer's  heart  with  awe." 

Those  are  probably  the  only  two  rememberable 
lines  that  Moody  wrote;  but  it  is  an  achievement, 
in  this  world  of  forgetfulness,  to  build  two  lines  that 
may  last.  And  the  achievement  of  Saint  Gaudens 
will  certainly  last. 

Chicago  loves  to  tell  of  the  visit  to  the  city  of 

339 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

Arnold  Bennett  of  the  Five  Towns.  He  was  taken, 
so  you  are  told,  on  a  motor  trip  over  the  miles  and 
miles  of  the  splendid  boulevard  system.  He  was 
told  one  fact  and  another  fact,  facts  were  piled  upon 
facts,  but  he  maintained  an  uninterested  mouth- 
breathing  silence.  From  the  Five  Towns  author 
came  naught  of  responsiveness.  Cost,  so  many 
millions,  height,  so  many  feet,  annual  business  totals 
so  many  billions,  figures  of  wealth,  education,  parks, 
business — nothing  mattered  to  Bennett. 

It  is  typical  of  the  city  that  this  is  deemed  a  joke 
on  the  novelist  and  not  on  the  city.  If  Bennett 
could  be  shown  and  told  so  much  and  feel  no  interest 
in  it,  so  much  the  worse  for  Bennett !  But  even  that 
English  novelist  was  for  a  moment  stirred.  The 
motor-car  swung  curvingly  in  front  of  the  Saint 
Gaudens  Lincoln,  and  Bennett  both  literally  and 
figuratively  sat  up.  "Now,  there  is  expression!" 
he  said. 

Chicago  has  always  considered  Lincoln  as  a 
Chicagoan.  It  was  a  Chicago  convention  that  set 
him  on  his  way  to  the  Presidency.  He  was  of 
Illinois,  and  all  Illinois — that  is,  so  much  of  it 
as  the  city  cares  for — is  taken,  quite  casually,  as 
being  of  Chicago.  The  city  so  ignores  the  State 
as  a  separate  entity  that,  whereas  you  will  hear  the 
word  "Chicago"  on  the  lips  of  Chicagoans  a  thou- 
sand times  a  day,  you  will  hear  the  word  "Illinois" 
scarcely  once  in  a  year. 

A  son  of  Lincoln,  his  son  Robert,  a  Harvard  man, 
became  a  Chicagoan,  and  rose  to  high  place,  as  Sec- 

340 


A  CHILD  AND  ITS  A-B-C 

retary  of  War,  Ambassador  to  Great  Britain,  and  a 
possible  candidate  for  the  Presidency. 

And  I  have  heard  a  haunting  story,  in  Chicago — 
perhaps  a  myth,  like  myths  that  come  in  older  towns 
— of  a  woman  who,  in  the  wild  night  hours  of  the 
Great  Fire,  was  driven,  huddled  in  an  open  wagon 
and  with  a  few  scattered  belongings  around  her 
feet,  to  the  door  of  a  house  where  all  were  strangers 
to  her.  She  knew  not  where  to  go,  she  murmured; 
would  they  let  her  in?  She  was  Mrs.  Lincoln,  so 
she  dazedly  said,  the  widow  of  the  President.  And 
they  took  her  in. 

The  impressiveness  of  the  honors  paid,  on  the 
arrival  of  Lincoln's  body  in  Chicago,  are  still  re- 
membered as  if  they  were  of  yesterday,  and  you  are 
thrilled  as  some  Chicagoan  tells  of  them;  the  dull, 
drab  day,  the  solemn  tolling  of  bells,  the  sound  of 
muffled  drums,  the  massing  of  throngs,  of  hundreds 
of  thousands,  to  wait  in  somber  patience  till  the 
catafalque  should  pass.  And  they  tell  of  how, 
while  the  body  lay  in  state  in  a  dimly-lit  rotunda, 
grieving  people  filed  slowly  by,  for  hour  after  hour, 
day  and  night. 

In  other  cities,  before  the  body  reached  Chicago 
on  its  slow  and  honored  journey  to  its  final  rest- 
ing place,  Lincoln's  body  had  also  lain  in  state; 
and,  when  it  lay  thus  in  New  York,  a  youth  who  in 
after  years  was  to  become  known  as  the  sculptor, 
Saint  Gaudens,  made  one  of  the  line  of  immensity 
of  length  that  slowly  edged  its  way  to  view  the 
dead  man 's  face.  He  gazed  in  awe.  Fascinated,  he 

341 


returned  to  the  end  of  the  line  and  again  moved 
onward,  inch  by  inch,  for  hours,  till  he  was  again 
beside  the  great  President  and  could  again  look 
fixedly  upon  his  face. 

How  little  did  Saint  Gaudens — that  brilliant  son 
of  a  French  father  and  an  Irish  mother — then  think 
that,  as  a  man  and  as  an  artist,  he  was  to  model 
Abraham  Lincoln  to  stand  imperishably  in  Chicago ! 
— that,  in  making  the  noblest  of  the  statues  of  Lin- 
coln, he  was  at  the  same  time  to  accomplish  the 
finest  of  his  own  distinguished  achievements. 

The  monument  is  in  Lincoln  Park,  close  to  North 
Avenue  Boulevard.  Lincoln  is  standing,  a  serene 
and  thoughtful  and  kindly  man,  a  man  of  firmness 
and  of  wisdom.  His  head  is  slightly  bowed  in 
thought.  Behind  him  is  a  splendid  chair  in  bronze, 
a  curule  chair,  the  seat  of  a  master  of  men ;  and  the 
wonder  of  it  is  that  this  chair,  looking  like  the  seat 
of  some  great  ruler  of  ancient  classic  times,  a  chair 
which  represents  the  beauty  and  the  dignity  of 
ancient  art,  should  go  appropriately  with  the  figure 
of  this  man  of  the  formative  days  of  America's 
Middle  West.  Unshakable  as  the  very  bronze  and 
granite,  steady,  serene,  self-poised,  he  would  fit  in 
any  environment,  this  man  of  the  ages:  and  Saint 
Gaudens  recognized  the  fact  and  chose  for  this  man 
of  the  prairie  and  the  backwoods  a  chair  fit  for  some 
mighty  dignitary  of  old  Borne. 

Phillips  Brooks  used  to  tell  of  going,  one  day, 
into  the  Museum  of  Fine  Arts,  in  Boston,  and  see- 
ing Saint  Gaudens  absorbed  before  the  cast  of  a 

342 


LIBRARY 

OF  THE 

UNIVERSITY  OF  ILLINOIS 


A  CHILD  AND  ITS  A-B-C 

classic  seat  a  masterpiece  of  ancient  art.  After  a 
while  Bishop  Brooks  again  passed,  and  still  Saint 
Gaudens  was  absorbed  in  contemplation  of  the  chair. 
Some  time  afterwards,  meeting  the  sculptor,  the 
bishop  told  him  of  having  seen  htm  in  profound 
study  of  the  chair,  and  Saint  Gaudens  replied  that 
he  had  been  studying  it  for  use  on  a  Lincoln  monu- 
ment in  Chicago. 

Lincoln  and  the  chair  are  upon  a  granite  base 
some  seven  feet  in  height,  set  within  a  great  oval 
space,  reached  by  splendid,  broad,  and  easy-mount- 
ing steps  and  enclosed  within  a  mighty  roll  of 
granite  which  is  fronted,  throughout  its  curving 
length,  by  a  rounding  granite  seat. 

The  weather  has  dealt  gently  with  the  bronze, 
giving  it  a  silvery  patina.  A  trifle  above  the  level 
of  Lincoln's  feet  are  the  feet  of  the  chair,  on  their 
base  of  bronze,  and  this  seemingly  little  point  adds 
effectiveness.  Every  point,  every  detail,  was 
pondered  over:  the  long  coat,  the  waistcoat, 
crumpled  like  that  of  a  man  who  sits  much  at  his 
desk,  the  familiar  whiskers,  the  smooth  upper  lip, 
the  deep-set  brooding  eyes,  the  long  straight  nose, 
the  fine,  strong,  kindly  mouth,  the  firmness  without 
obstinacy,  the  absolute  strength  with  no  particle  of 
self-assertiveness. 

The  setting  of  the  monument,  within  its  oval  space, 
giving  it  a  sweeping  breadth  and  dignity,  is  superb, 
with  trees  and  shrubs  and  grass,  with  great  stretches 
of  the  greenery  of  the  park,  and  with  the  near-by 
lake  stretching  off  in  glory. 

343 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

Strength  and  wisdom,  greatness,  always  the  kind- 
liness— and  one  day,  as  I  looked,  there  came  the 
thought  of  that  story  told  by  Joseph  Jefferson  of 
a  kindliness  offered  when  Jefferson  was  but  a  boy 
and  Lincoln  was  but  a  young  lawyer. 

Jefferson's  father  went  with  his  family  from 
Chicago  to  Springfield,  and  there  built  a  bare  and 
barnlike  theater  which  took  every  dollar  that  could 
by  possibility  be  raised :  only  to  be  faced,  just  as  he 
was  ready  to  open,  by  a  suddenly  passed  ordinance 
which  placed  a  heavy  license  tax  on  any  theater. 
The  situation,  for  the  Jeffersons,  was  crushingly 
hopeless.  And  this  fact  must  somehow  have  become 
known,  for  a  young  lawyer,  named  Abraham  Lincoln, 
called  and  offered  to  present  the  case  to  the  town 
council.  He  made  only  a  single  stipulation;  which 
was,  that  there  should  be  no  fee.  And  he  went  be- 
fore the  council,  and  so  argued  the  case,  with  such 
a  mixture  of  logic  and  humor,  that  the  lawmakers 
at  once  reversed  their  unjust  act. 

The  Chicago  poet,  Masters,  wrote  of  Lincoln,  and 
the  lines  seem  fittingly  applicable: 

' '  And- 1  saw  a  man  arise  from  the  soil  like  a  fabled  giant 
And  throw  himself  over  a  deathless  destiny." 

A  figure  from  the  land  of  pure  romance  was  Lin- 
coln :  for  what  a  romance  was  his  life !  "The  tender 
grace  of  a  day  that  is  dead" — how  sweet  and  fine 
a  memory  did  he  leave !  The  Jefferson  incident,  in 
its  kindliness  of  heart,  shows  him  as  the  same  man 
as  the  Lincoln  of  Gettysburg.  What  fine  essences 

344 


A  CHILD  AND  ITS  A-B-C 

and  flavors  of  history  come  when  one  summons  up 
remembrances  of  Lincoln's  past! 

Even  to  non-Americans,  the  fineness  of  this  rep- 
resentative American  shows  in  this  statue.  I  saw 
a  Swedish  woman  stop  and  look,  and  in  a  little  while 
a  light  of  comprehension  came  into  her  eyes,  and  as 
she  walked  away  she  held  herself  more  erect  and 
looked  as  if  she  felt  herself  on  a  higher  plane.  No 
wonder  Jane  Addams  made  a  pilgrimage  here  one 
weary,  worried  day,  solely  to  get  inspiration  from 
looking  at  this  face.  No  one  can  look  at  this  statue 
of  this  unselfish  statesman,  and  strive  to  understand, 
without  becoming  himself  a  more  unselfish  citizen. 
Gradually  one  realizes  how  strongly  unselfishness 
governed  him.  "  Government  of  the  people,  by  the 
people,  and  for  the  people,  shall  not  perish  from  the 
earth":  no  words  of  his  are  more  often  quoted,  and 
they  are  quoted  as  if  meaning  that  free  government 
has  within  it  some  forever  continuing  power,  where- 
as, in  reality,  the  noble  phrase  is  governed  by  words 
immediately  preceding  it,  declaring  that  it  depends 
on  the  people  themselves,  who  must  first  "highly 
resolve  that  the  dead  shall  not  have  died  in  vain." 

Come  to  this  statue  as  twilight  approaches,  and 
you  feel  that  the  romance  and  the  history  of  his  life 
are  now  seen  through  the  soft  twilight  that  hovers 
over  all  fine  history  and  over  all  romance.  And 
yet  you  feel  that  the  twilight  of  history  will  not 
greatly  dim  this  great  and  lonely  figure. 

The  statue  stands  where  he  would  have  liked  to 
know  it  would  stand,  there  in  the  open  spaces,  yet 

345 


THE  BOOK  OF  CHICAGO 

so  near  the  throbbing  heart  of  the  city,  so  near  the 
great  and  restless  lake. 

And  one  day  in  the  late  afternoon,  an  afternoon 
of  sweet  beauty,  with  a  gentle  rosy  color  from  the 
slowly  sinking  sun,  and  clouds  of  glory  trailing 
slowly  by,  I  stood  for  a  little  while,  for  people  were 
stopping  and  looking,  as  people  so  often  stop;  and 
three  soldiers,  khaki-clad,  two  of  them  wounded, 
looked  up  at  him  with  a  curious  intentness ;  and  one 
of  them  read  aloud,  in  a  low  voice,  from  the  letter- 
ing on  the  monument,  ''Let  us,  to  the  end,  dare  to 
do  our  duty  as  we  understand  it." 

A  little  girl,  who  was  still  a  child,  intently  watched 
the  soldiers  as  they  looked  and  read,  and  as  they 
went  thoughtfully  away  she  mounted  the  steps  of 
the  monument  and  walked  reverently  around  the 
statue  on  the  sweep  of  the  granite  base.  She 
vaguely  knew  or  vaguely  divined  that  there  was 
something  unusual  about  this  man  of  bronze.  She 
was  a  quiet  little  girl,  with  the  glow  of  intelligence 
in  her  wide-open  eyes :  she  walked  with  awe  around 
the  man  of  bronze,  then  suddenly  came  to  a  stop  in 
his  very  shadow,  for  her  eyes  caught  the  great  let- 
ters of  his  name  deeply  sunk  in  the  great  curve  of 
the  enclosing  granite  wall.  She  could  not  read — 
but  she  caught  the  "A"  and  her  eyes  flashed  with 
delight.  And  next  to  "A"  came  "B,"  and  she 
ran  her  fingers  through  the  grooves  of  the  letters, 
and  looked  up  happily  as  if  to  share  her  triumph 
with  the  bronze  figure  towering  above.  She  was 
learning  her  letters  from  Abraham  Lincoln!  The 

346 


A  CHILD  AMD  ITS  A-B-C 

"C"  at  first  eluded  her.  But  along  the  line  she 
went  until  the  "C"  was  reached.  It  was  a  fasci- 
nating sight.  For  she  had  her  ' '  A-B-C ' '  from  Abra- 
ham Lincoln. 


347 


INDEX 


Adams,  John  Quincy,  181 

Adams  Street,  46 

Adams,  Wayman,  166 

Addams,  Jane,  4,  280 

Ade,  George,  141,  202,  212,  294 

Advertisements,    19,    78,    173-7, 

198,  210 
"A.  L.  A.,"  153 

Alleys,  78,  94,  125,  234,  235,  303 
American    Library    Association, 

153 


"R 

Banks,  74,  75 

Baptists,  242 

Baum,  Colonel,  57 

Beaubien,  216 

Bennett,  Arnold,  87,  340 

"Best    Sellers,"     148;    and    see 

"Novels" 
Betts,  253 

Black  Hawk  War,  25,  26,  63 
Blaine,  29 
Blue  Island,  293 


Ancestors    and    descendants,    22,  **.  Board  of  Trade,  76 


23,  316-20 

Anderson,  Robert,  26 

Apartment  houses,  331 

Apollo,  216 

Architecture,  72,  74,  75,  96,  118, 
119,  231,  236-8,  240,  248,  249, 
279,  328 

Art,  155-71 

Art  Institute,  42,  152,  156,  160, 
161,  163-71 

Artists:  Adams,  166;  Betts,  253; 
Chase,  166;  Clarkson,  111,  162, 
253;  Hals,  170;  Healy,  24, 
157-60;  Henri,  166;  Hobbema, 
170;  Homer,  166;  Houdon, 
164;  Inness,  167;  Johnson, 
252;  MacMonnies,  234,  336; 


Boston  Bags,  4 

Boston  Tea  Party,  326,  327 

Bremer,  Fredrika,  320 

Brooks,  Phillips,  342 

Brown,  John,  57;  his  fort,  211 

Burnham,  Daniel  H.,  231 

— C.— 

Cahokia  Court  House,  235 
Caldwell,  Billy,  274 
Calumet  Avenue,  120 
Carleton,  Will,  146 
Caton,  Mary,  51 
Central  Church,  221 
Chatfield-Taylor,  160 
Cheney,  Bishop,  44,  45 


Melchers,     169,    252;     Parker,  N  Chicago :       Claimed      by      three 


252,  253;  Pennell,  88,  166; 
Raeburn,  166;  Rembrandt,  169; 
Ruben=,  170;  St.  Gaudens,  46, 
47,  76,  156;  Stuart,  155,  158; 
Taft,  165;  Terburg,  175;  Van 
Dyck,  169;  Whistler,  156,  157 

Arts  Club,  107 

Ashland  Avenue,  281 

Astor  Street,  329 

Auditorium,  221 


349 


States,  16;  almost  in  Wiscon- 
sin, 17;  part  of  Virginia,  16; 
unexpected  location  of,  19; 
origin  of  name,  29.  3D;  a  cos- 
mopolitan city,  19;  zone  of  in- 
fluence, 9;  as  railway  center, 
9;  likeness  to  Boston,  4,  44,  48 
Chicago  Athletic  Association,  110 
Chicago  Church  Choir  Pinafore 
Company,  219 


INDEX 


Chicago  Club,  110  "A  Dearborn,  General,  61,  155 

•Chicago  River,  58-60,  64,  65,  156,      Department  Store,  179,  180 
270,   271,   272;    reversing   cur- 
rent, 184,  187 

Chicago  Woman's  Club,  104 

Chief  Chicagou,  29 ;  in  Paris,  29 


De  Koven,  Reginald,  222 
De  Koven  Street,  276,  277 
Demidoff  collection,  170-1 
Directory,  the  first,  11 


Children,  205,  216,  320,  324,  325,       Divorces,  210 


345 
Chimes,  251 
Chinese,  282 
Christ  Church,  45 
Christian  Scientists,  335 
Churches:    Central,   221;    Christ, 

45 ;     Christian     Science,     335 ; 

First        Presbyterian,         115; 

Fourth       Presbyterian,       335 ; 

Notre  Dame  de  Chicago,  275; 

Our  Lady  of  Pompeii,  276;  St. 

Ansgarius,      214,       215;       St. 

Clement's,    336;     St.    James's, 

52 ;      St.      Mary's-by-the-Lake, 

336;     St.    Paul's,    336;     early 

churches,  13 
Hall,  70 
Clark,  George  Rogers,  16,  31 
Clarkson,  Ralph,  111,  162,  253 
Cliff  Dwellers,  111 
Clubs,  101-13,  206,  296 
Cobb,  Silas  B.,  253 
Coliseum,  117 
Color  effects,  87,  88,  283 
Coolidge,  Charles  A.,  249 
Commercial  Club,  112 
Conventions,    Presidential,    27-9, 

64,  117,  127-8 
Cook  County,  17 
Cordon  Club,  105 
Counties,    for    Chicago,    17;     of 

Illinois,  17,  18 
Courtesy,  90,  91,  178 
Crerar  Library,  152 
Curtis,  George  W.,  199,  200 
Curzon,  Lady,  50 


Dogs,  11,  20 

"Dooley,  Mr.,"  139^1,  265 

Douglas,  Stephen  A.,  26,  127-8, 

319;  monument,  126 
Dowie,  292 
Doyle,  Conan,  149 
Drainage  Canal,  184-7 
Drug  stores,  13,  73,  74,  92 
Du  Maurier,  49,  50 
Dimes,   307-15 
Dunne,  Finley  Peter,  139-41,  265 

— E.— 

Early  Settlers,  23,  24,  60,  316-20 
East  Ninth  Street,  46 
Eleanor  Clubs,   106 
Evanston,  287,  289-91 

— F.— 


— D.— 

Dana,  Charles  A.,  147 
Daviess,  Jo,  18 
Davis,  Jefferson,  25,  26,  159 
Davis,  Jessie  Bartlett,  220 


Field,  Eugene,  134,  135,  136,  146, 

202,  325 
Field,  Museum,  43;  the  old,  237, 

238 
Fine  Arts  Building,  World's  Fair, 

237,  238 
Fire,  the  great,  52,  53,  150,  151, 

160,  179,  276,  278 
First  Presbyterian  Church,  115 
Firsts,    of    Chicago,    10-14,    23; 
boat,  33;  free  lunch,  82;  novel, 
133;   settlers,  60;  trade  agree 
ment,  30 

Forest  Preserves,  295-6 
X  Fort  Dearborn,  26,  60,  61,  124 
Fort  Sheridan,  292 
Fortnightly,  The,  105,  106 
Foundation  of  Library,  150 
Fountain  of  the  Great  Lakes,  168 
Fountain,   MacMonnies,   234 
Fountain,  St.  Gaudens  and  Mac- 
Monnies, 336 

350 


INDEX 


Fourth  Presbyterian  Church,  335 

Franklin,  337 

Free  Lunch,  82 

French,   the,   30,  37,  75,   269-74, 

275 

Friends  of  American  Art,  161 
Fuller,  Henry  B.,  144,  198 
Fuller,  Melville,  44 

— G.— 

Galli-Curci,  220,  221 
Garden,  Mary,  220 
Gardens,  7  """ 

Garfield  Park,  284 
Garland,  Hamlin,  134 
Gary,  297-306 
Gary,  Elbert  H.,  297-8 
Gary  Schools,  304-6 
-Ghetto,  282^1    - 
Gilder,  Richard  W.,  236,  237 
Glencoe,  291 
Gold  Coast,  326-38 
Graceland,  98 

Grant,  General,  28;   statue,  337 
Grant  Park,  40 
Great    Lakes    Training    Station, 

292 

Greeley,  Horace,  199 
Gross,  S.  E.,  154 
Guizot,  268 
Gunsaulus,  Doctor,  161,  169,  221, 

253 

— H.— 

Hale,  Susan,  330 

Hals,  Franz,  170 

Halsted  Street,  276 

Harding,  208 

Harper   Memorial   Library,   250, 

251 

Harper,  William  R.,  244-7,  252 
Harrison,  Carter,  241,  253,  258- 

64,  260,  265,  281 
Harrison,    Carter,    the    younger, 

264,  265 
Harrison,     William    Henry,     16, 

259,  262 
Heald,  Captain,  56,  61,  121 


Healy,  24,  157-60 

Helm,  Lieutenant,  124,  125 

Herrick,  Robert,  72,  119,  120,  212 

Hoar,  George  F.,  200 

Hobbema,  170 

Hole,  Dean,  115,  116 

Hospitality   of    Chicago,   5,    104, 

150 

Hospitals,  281 
Houdon,  164 

Hough,  Emerson,  55,  141,  142 
Hughes,  Thomas,  150 
Hull,  General,  61,  121,  217 
•Hull  House,  278-81 
Hutchinson,  Charles  L.,  169,  241, 

253 

Hutchinson  Gallery,  169-71 
Hutchinson  Hall,  252 


Ida  Noyes  Hall,  254 

Indian  boundary,  274 

Indians,  25,  26,  63,  274,  275,  296, 

312 

Indian  Reserve,  274 
Ingersoll,  Robert  G.,  28 
Inness,  167 

Insurance,  Tontine,  35 
Italians,  276,  282 


Jackson,  Andrew,  159 
Jackson  Park,  229-38 
Jefferson,  Joseph,  10,  343 
Joliet,  185,  187 
Judson,  Harry  Pratt,  247,  253 

— K.— 

Kennison,  David,  326-8 
Kinzies,  the,  23,  60,  65,  98,  122, 

123,  124,  133,  157 
Kipling,  84,  131-4,  157,  209,  230 
Kitchenettes,  332 


-L.- 


La  Rabida,  232 


351 


INDEX 


La  Salle,  30-7 
.La  Salle  Street,  76 

Lake  Calumet,  299 

Lake  Forest,  291 

Lake  Front,  6,  38-48;  in  early 
days,  10 

Lake  Geneva,  293 

Lake  Michigan,  deemed  a  draw- 
back, 6,  321,  322;  Chicagoans 
who  never  saw  it,  6 

Leiter,  Mary  V.,  50 

Level  of  city  raised,  79,  80 

Libraries:  Crerar,  152;  New- 
berry,  152,  160;  Public,  150-3, 
204;  Ryerson,  152,  169;  Uni- 
versity, 250,  251 

Lincoln,  Abraham:  in  Black 
Hawk  War,  25;  Lieutenant 
Anderson,  26;  Stephen  A. 
Douglas,  26,  127-8;  Inaugural 
Address,  127;  Nomination,  27; 
Joseph  Jefferson,  343 
•Lincoln  Monument,  339-47 

Lincoln  Park,  33,  328-35 

Lind,  Jenny,  214,  215,  225 

"Line  o'  Type,"  136 

"Little  Boy  Blue,"  325 

Little  Room,  111 

Logan  statue,  46,  47 

Loop,  The,  67-83 

Loop  Hounds,  67 

Lorimer,  George  H.,  136,  137,  145, 
202 

— M.— 

MacMonnies,  234,  336 
'Madison  Street,  46 
Magazine  of  Poetry,  145 
Mail  order  business,  180 
Mapleson,   Colonel,  261 
Mark  Twain,  132 
Marietta,  16 

Marquette,  Father,  30,  75,  269-74 
Martineau,  Harriet,  187,  320 
Massacre,    Chicago,    56,    62,    63, 

120-5;  monument,  124 
Masters,  Edgar  Lee,  71,  144,  145, 

344 
McCormick,  Cyrus  H.,  51,  52 


352 


McCutcheon,  John  T.,  200 

McKinley,  338 

Medinah  Temple,  54 

Melchers,  Gari,  169,  252 

Melrose  Park,  32 

Merchandising,  178,  179,  180 

"Merchant  Prince  of  Cornville," 

154 
•Michigan  Avenue,  38-48,  58 

Midway  Plaisance,  227-9,  247, 
248 

Mitchell  Tower,  251 

Monroe,  Harriet,  145 

Monroe  Street,  31,  46 

Monuments  and  statues:  Barlow, 
162;  Douglas,  126;  Goethe, 
337;  Grant,  337;  Kennison, 
327 ;  Lincoln,  339-46 ;  La  Salle, 
33;  Logan,  46;  Marquette 
Cross,  273;  Massacre,  124; 
McKinley,  338;  the  Republic, 
233;  Washington,  164 

Moody,  Dwight  L.,  209,  210 

Moody,  William  V.,  18,  145,  339 

Morgan,  Anna,  222 

Municipal  Pier,  58 

Music,  214-26,  246 


— N.— 

Nasby,  Petroleum  V.,  127 
Newberry  Library,  152,  160 
Negroes,  117 
Norris,  Frank,  52,  138 
Northwest  Territory,  16,  31 
Notre  Dame  de  Chicago,  275 
Novels:    148;    "Barriers   Burned 
Away,"  143;  "The  Cliff  Dwell- 
ers," 144,  198;  "The  Chevalier 
of   Pensieri-Vani,"    144;    "The 
Common   Lot,"    72;    "The  Fat 
of  the  Land,"  143;  "Fifty-four 
Forty    or    Fight,"    142;    "The 
Girl  at  the  Half-way  House," 
142;     "Letters    from    a    Self- 
Made   Merchant   to   his   Son," 
136;   "The  Magnificent  Adven- 
ture,"   142;    "The    Mississippi 
Bubble,"  142;   "The  Octopus," 


INDEX 


138;   "The  Pit,"  52,  95,   138; 
"Wau-Bun,"  133 

—0.— 

Ogden,    William    B.,     159,    160, 

267-8 

"Oliver  Optic,"  153 
Opera  Company,  Chicago,  221 
Orchestra  Hall,  223 
Orchestra,  Symphony,  222-6 
Oregon,  162 
Outlying  centers,  89,  281 

p 

-Palmer  House,  81,  167,  209 

Palmers,  Potter,  the,  4,  81,  167, 
330,  331 

Parks:  Douglas  Monument,  126; 
Garfield,  284;  Grant,  40;  Lin- 
coln, 328-35;  Jackson,  229-38 

Pennell,  Joseph,  88,  166 

Peristyle,  42,  46 

Pinkerton,  Allen,  14 

"Pit,  The,"  52,  95,  138 

Poets  and  Poetry,  8,  39,  65,  71, 
126,  144,  145,  322,  325,  332, 
333,  344 

Policemen,  85,  86,  208 

Pompeii,  Our  Lady  of,  276 

Pope,  Nathaniel,  17 

Portraits:  Jean  Cameron,  166; 
Cobb,  253;  Dearborn,  155; 
Helen  Dubois,  169;  Mrs.  Gor- 
don, 157;  Gunsaulus,  253; 
Harper,  253;  Healy,  158; 
Hutchinson,  169,  253;  Judson, 
253;  Pennell,  166;  Rockefeller, 
252;  Ryerson,  252;  Spinola,  170 

Post-Office,  70 

Prairie  Avenue,  114-30 

Prairie  Club,  296-314 

Presidential  Conventions,  27-9, 
64,  117,  127-8 

Pronunciations,  201 

Public  Library,  150-3 

Publishers,  147,  148,  323 

Pullman,  George  M.,  80,  124 


-Q— 

Quadrangle  Club,  109 
— R  — 

Raeburn,  166 

Randolph  Street,  46 

Reed,  Myrtle,  289 

Rembrandt,  169 

Restaurants,  82,  83,  92 

Robey  Street,  272,  273 

Rockefeller,  John  D.,  239-44,  252 

Root,  George  F.,  217-9 

Rostand,  154 

Rubens,  170 

Rush  Street  Bridge,  58-60,  266 

Ryerson  Library,  152,  169 

Ryerson,  Martin  A.,  152,  169,  252 

— S.— 


St.  Clements,  336 

St.  Gaudens,  46,  47,  76,  156,  234, 

336,  337,  339,  341,  342 
St.  James,  52 
St.  Loyola,  335 
St.  Ma'ry's-by-the-Lake,  336 
St.  Mary's-of-the-Lake,  14 
St.  Paul,  336 
Seal  of  the  City,  6,  7 
Settlers,  Early,  23-4,  60,  316-20 
Shopping,   15,  69,  73,  79,  89,  92, 

93,  178,   179,   180 
Sinclair,  Upton,  144 
Skokie,  294,  295,  296 
Skyscrapers,  6,  9,  70 
Smoke,  15,  77,  87,  125 
Soap,  15 

Society,  202,  203,  204,  328-31 
Soil  of  the  City,  80 
Songs,  218,  219 
South  Water  Street,  64 
"Spoon  River  Anthology,"  144 
^   Sporting  goods,  211 
>  Stockyards,  181-4 
Streets  and  Ways,  84-100 
Streeter,  Doctor,  143 
Streeter,  George  H.,  188-97 
Streeterville,  191-7 
Stuart,  Gilbert,  155,  158 

353 


INDEX 


Subways,  Freight,  178 
Suburbs,  286-96 
Sunday,  "Billy,"  209 
Sunday  Observance,  208,  209 
Swedish  Church,  214,  215 
"Swinging    around    the    Circle," 

127  , 

Symphony  Orchestra,  222-6 

— T.— 

Taft,  Lorado,  168 

Taft,  President,  27 

Taylor,  B.  F.,  322 

Taylor,  "B.L.T.,"  136 

Terburg,  170 

Theaters,  206-8 

Thomas,  Theodore,  223-6 

Thompson,  Mayor,  267 

Tilghman,  316 

Tippecanoe,  18,  24,  259 

Tonti,  34-6 

Tontitown,  35 

Trade  Agreement,  the  first,  30 

Tremont  House,  78,  80,  127 

— U.— 

Union  League  Club,  109 
University  Club,  112,  113,  206 
University  of  Chicago:   the  first, 

128,  241,  242;  the'present»  129» 

239-55 

— V— 

Van  Dyck,  169 

Vicereines,  American,  50,  51 

Victoria,  Queen;  gift  to  Library, 

151 
Vincennes,  16 


Virginia,  Chicago  part  of,  16 
— W.— 

Wales,  Prince  of,  266 
Washington,  George,  24,  33,  62, 

164 

Water  Tower,  53 
"Wau-Bun,"  133 
Wauhegan,  292 
Wedgwood  collection,  161 
Wells,  Captain,  56,  62,  122,  123 
Wentworth,  John,  181,  265-7 
Western  Avenue,  90 
Wheat  Pit,  77 
Wheaton,  297 
Whistler,  156,  157 
White  City,  227-38 
White  Paper  Club,  109 
Whittier,  167 

"Who's  Who  in  America,"  148 
Wilcox,  Ella  Wheeler,  146 
Wilde,  Oscar,  150,  230,  231 
Willard,  Frances,  4,  286-9 
Wilmette,  291 
Winnetka,  291 
Wisconsin,  17,  19 
Women  of  Chicago,  4,  49,  50,  72, 

86,  87 

Women's  Clubs,  104,  105,  106 
Wooded  Island,  235 
World's  Fair,  227-38 
Wright,  Harold  Bell,  148 
Wyatt,  Edith,  150 

— Z.— 

"Zenobia,"  162 
Zeisler,  Fanny  B.,  222 
Zion  City,  292 
Zone  of  Influence,  9 


354 


a  01 12  040436831 


